Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 1726: Hit, Stand, or Surrender

Episode Date: July 28, 2021

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the one-for-one A’s-Marlins swap involving Starling Marte and Jesús Luzardo, Marte’s underrated career, and Miami’s enviable pitching stockpile, then discuss the circumstances surrounding a potential trade of Max Scherzer. After that (35:21), they talk to FiveThirtyEight senior writer Neil Paine about the factors that affect whether teams add […]

Velico Starling, annual migration, grading because you're back Speak something good, united but untied, happy to go away Which way to a star? At last an equator Hello and welcome to episode 1726 of Effectively Wild, a baseball podcast from Fangraphs brought to you by our Patreon supporters. I'm Ben Lindberg of The Ringer, joined by Rowley of FanCrafts. Hello Meg. Hello. We're trying to pick a time when what we say will not be immediately outdated

during deadline week which is almost impossible so no matter when we record there will almost certainly be a trade that breaks right after we do but we will get to it eventually and we will just talk about what we can talk about, what we know so far. Later in this episode we will be joined by Neil Payne of FiveThirtyEight,

who will help us break down the deadline, how to decide whether you should add or subtract. Neil has come up with a stat called the Doyle number that helps distill all of those complicated factors down into a single figure, which can kind of give you a guide, though, as we will discuss, there are many other factors that come into play. So we'll talk about that general framework and also some of the specific teams that are deciding whether to upgrade now or to set their sights on the long term. But we do have some trades and an interesting trade to talk about. Michael Givens going to the Reds.

No, not that one. I mean, that's kind of interesting for Reds fans, I guess. But the really interesting one, which is done as we record here on Wednesday afternoon, is a one-for-one between Miami and Oakland with Starling Marte going to Oakland and Jesus Lizardo going back to Miami. And this is a fascinating trade. Love a one-for-one. Love a one-for-one. Yeah. We don't get a whole lot of those. No.

Luzardo's technically not a prospect anymore, but he is young enough to still be described as a prospect and obviously entered even this season with high expectations. So to see him moved for a rental player, Starling Marte, who is going to hit free agency soon, that was a real wow. They made me say wow with that one yeah I think that I feel like Stefan this trade has everything I think that if you are an Oakland fan maybe this trade is like a Rorschach test for how you feel about your team just sort of generally because I can see the argument that folks might make that this feels heavy for a rental player, right? That Lizardo is under team control, I think until 2027, 26? Yeah, through the 26 season, yeah.

So he has a ton of team control remaining. We have seen what good, locked in, healthy Lizardo looks like, and it is something. It's really quite something. And it has not been that something this year. Right. And I think you're right to say that there were big expectations for him coming into the season. But it's easy with a player this young who has shown the capacity to pitch the way that Lizardo has to think, well, you just fix him, like just fix him. And then he'll be this for a really long time. And surely a team that is cost conscious like Oakland would care about having a really good, young, team controlled pitcher for that long. And, you know, you can look at the fact that the Marlins are paying, really, it looks team with the fourth lowest payroll in baseball, perennially a subject of grievances from the Players Association, although I guess the A's have been before too. So it's not exactly two huge spending teams matching up here. But yeah, the Marlins, good for them for once using some money to get back better talent. Yeah, using that payroll flexibility to get something. And so you could look at all of that and be like, well, this is a bummer. But I also think that you can look at it and say that there is something to the idea that sometimes guys stall out with a particular dev regime and a team has tried to sort of get him back on track for a while and hasn't succeeded.

to sort of get him back on track for a while and hasn't succeeded. And Miami is sort of quietly, or maybe at this point, not so quietly establishing itself as a place that can develop pitching, right? And do good work there. And so maybe you're the A's and you say, Marte makes us better today. We'd like to keep pace with the Astros sort of unequivocally, unlike some of our other division mates, right? And so this makes us better today, and we haven't been able to get this guy back on track. And so, you know, we wish him well. And if he develops into a great pitcher with Miami, then we're going to regret that a couple years down the road. But if Marte sort of helps push them over the finish line, either making some sort of a challenge for the division,

which seems unlikely to me, but or perhaps puts them in a better position from the wild card, then I think it is defensible in that respect. So you can be bummed or happy for either side. This is probably why one for ones are great, right? Because there's great stakes and you can talk yourself into almost anything. Yeah. I mean, Luzardo looked like one of the most promising pitchers in baseball up until very recently. Like he was a top 10 prospect according to a lot of outlets before 2019, before 2020. He was a ranked prospect even entering 2018 and would have been this year if he hadn't already lost his rookie eligibility. So like highly touted and sky high ceiling and all of that. And last year,

he pitched pretty well, you know, in his first little taste of the big leagues in 2019. And then last year, he was, you know, a bit inconsistent. But when he was good, he looked really good. And he got some rookie of the year votes. And then really everything has fallen apart this year, but it's just one year. And he had that weird injury, the video game related injury where he slapped a table or something and hurt his hand because he was playing a video game. And then when he came back from that, you know, he missed a month or so, and then he just has not been effective either in the majors or in AAA. And that is somewhat worrisome. And it makes me more worried about him really that Oakland is trading him here. Like they're not giving him away for nothing, but the fact that they evidently have enough doubts that they are willing to wager, you know, the next several seasons of Luzardo for a couple months of Marte.

That has to be a bit concerning, right? I mean, yes, as you said, it may just be a change of scenery candidate kind of situation. But still, when you have a team like Oakland that obviously prizes young, cost-controlled players, and you have a player who has looked as good as Luzardo has until pretty recently. And that team is giving up on him after having him for, well, not his entire career, but most of his career. Yeah. That is somewhat scary.

So that makes you a bit worried. On the other hand, it's just not long ago that he was talked about as one of the best young pitchers in baseball. It's just not long ago that he was talked about as one of the best young pitchers in baseball. Like earlier this year on the Ringer podcast, we did a draft of the top 25 players under 25. And Lusardo was someone I went back and forth on. And he was like one of my last cuts, ultimately didn't make my list, but was like close to the top of the list of players who I'm going to regret not ranking this guy a few years down the road. And I don't know. I don't want to feel better about that because I want things to regret not ranking this guy a few years down the road. And I don't know. I don't want to feel better about that because I want things to turn out well for him.

But yeah, whenever a top prospect is traded, there's been some research that shows that maybe that can be correlated with worse outcomes down the road just because you figure the organization that had the guy for a long time and knows him best might know something others don't and might have causes for concern. But obviously, it would be far from the first time that someone gave up on a guy too soon. Not that they're necessarily giving up on him, but they have decided that this is worthwhile, which is somewhat surprising, but also fun because they are getting a good player back here. Yeah, I think when you look at their current outfield configuration marty is a is just like a clear upgrade on you know steven pascati right like so now you have

an outfield of marcana and starling marty and oh ramon lariano who could forget except for me temporarily moment right and you think about that you you're like, well, that seems really good. Yeah. That seems like it's quite encouraging. Now, you know, Marte is having this like crazy year. I think that there are some peripherals to suggest that he's playing sort of a little ahead of where his underlying metrics might suggest he should, you look at that like 376 BABIP and think, hmm, is that really like what you're expecting from him at age 32?

But he has run high BABIPs historically. So you're like, I don't know. I think he's just good. I think he's just a good player. So he's going to help them in the more immediate term and we'll kind of see where it goes from there. Yeah, maybe he replaces Piscotty. Maybe he replaces Mitch Moreland or someone else bumps Mitch Moreland at least against certain pitchers. And so I think it can't hurt. Like Oakland's WRC Plus just overall non-pitchers is 14th this year, so it's not a great offense. It's middle of the pack.

19th against lefties. And Marte, as a righty, helps there. So it is a significant upgrade. And Oakland, even though they do have those perennially low payrolls, they're not averse to pushing their chips in at the deadline. They've done that before. You think back to the John Lester trade in 2014, for instance. So they will go for it. And this does help. And of course, as we should say, blanket disclaimer with any trade analysis, there could be more moves to come for either one of these teams. But I think that Marte is just like he's generally underrated, just like over the course of his career, he's just been a very good player. And maybe it's that

he's played for some smaller market teams and some not great teams recently or just that he's one of those like all-around good players who's never like the best player he's not a superstar but he's just kind of good at everything like he hits for a pretty good average he gets on base and he hits for pretty decent power he's a pretty good runner he's a pretty good fielder. He's pretty good at everything. And so he's heading probably for like all of very good status at the end of his career, depending on which war you use. He's around 30 war already for the course of his career and not slowing down yet. And I was just looking at baseball reference,

looking to see how he stacks up against other players in the majors dating back to 2013, which is his first full season in the majors. And the names that he is next to are really pretty impressive guys who are much bigger names, but have the same sort of production. So dating back to the beginning of 2013, according to Baseball Reference War, Marte is at 31.9 war. That ranks 17th among all position players. And here are the guys within a win of him in either direction. Kyle Seeger, Nelson Cruz, Anthony Rendon, Bryce Harper, Robinson Cano, Justin Turner, Buster Posey. That's not counting framing at baseball reference. But, you know, Jose Ramirez, like these are big names, like according to baseball reference

where he has a higher war than Bryce Harper over a period during which they were both playing, which is really pretty impressive. So not flashy, really doesn't have a lot of black ink. Like he led the majors in games played in the pandemic season, and then he led the league in caught stealing twice earlier in his career. And that's his only black ink on his B-Ref page. And he made one all-star team back in 2016. He won gold gloves in 2015 and 2016. So doesn't stand out, but really just dependably quite good. Right. I think you're right that if he had played for different teams, he would be someone who we talk about in that same group with much greater frequency. I think the Pittsburgh of it all does its work. And then last year he started out in Arizona and had that great start and then kind of cooled after the trade to the Marlins. So even though they ended up being a playoff team between his production sort of dipping a little bit and then their early exit, like we didn't get.

It's not like last year we got like a great Marte like postseason moment, really. But yeah, he's just he's just a really good, solid player. And I think that he will he will add a good deal to that Oakland lineup. So I like it for them. I don't know. You always have to be careful not to hold on to the guys you can't fix for too long. But if he ends up, if Lozardo ends up being what Miami, I assume, thinks he will be, given what they gave up to get him, their sort of willingness to pay the salary here.

That Marlins rotation is going to be fearsome. Although without Yemi Garcia, who they traded as we started recording. So the Astros now getting Yemi Garcia, it looks like. Yeah. So a couple of things. So Marte, this is his second straight deadline being traded. His third time being traded since the start of last season. So a lot of teams want him.

I guess that is the positive spin to put on this. But yeah, from the A's perspective, you can see why they would want to kind of go all in now just because there's so much uncertainty surrounding that whole organization. Both contractually speaking, because they have a whole lot of guys entering arbitration or in line for raises in arbitration. And again, it's Oakland. So who knows what that does to their payroll or how many of those guys are sticking around. And of course, there is the ongoing uncertainty about where the A's will actually be playing going forward for much of Jesus Lizardo's career. So there's all of that, all of those unknowns. So yeah, go for it while you can. And then from the Marlins perspective,

first of all, as you would say, perhaps a nice bit of business to turn Starling Marte into Jesus Lizardo because they didn't give up a ton, really. it looks like now, to get Marte when they traded for him last year. And they turned him into something possibly potentially special in Lizardo. So nice little flip there. And as you alluded to, the young talent in that rotation and on that staff is really pretty impressive. impressive. So if you just look at 25 and under war by starting rotations this season at Fangraphs, Marlins have more than seven war from starters that young, and that is more than double the next best team. And that's guys like Trevor Rogers, Pablo Lopez, Sandy Alcantara, Braxton Garrett. That doesn't count Sixto Sanchez, who's been hurt and missed the whole season,

it, that doesn't count Sixto Sanchez, who's been hurt and missed the whole season, or Eliezer Hernandez, who's 26, or Zach Thompson, who's 27. So the whole team's average pitcher age of 27.6 is the lowest in the National League. And that's after trading Zach Gallin for Jazz Chisholm, right? So they've just really been minting many pitchers lately. And non-pitcher wrc plus is 21st this year and marty has been their best hitter so they're really sort of lopsided and they need offense and so this might not be the last time that that they add a pitcher and then move him elsewhere there could be another zach gallen style trade in their future where they try to even things out a little bit yeah and that doesn't even count like Max Meyer, who hasn't debuted for them yet,

but who came into the season ranked, I think, 25th overall for us on the preseason top 100. And I should say, I think I said he won't be in the rotation, but Yemi Garcia is a reliever, so it would make sense that he not be in the rotation. But I meant staff. So just in case people are like, oh, Meg, you moron. I'm shush.

So yeah, they are kind of lopsided. And it does seem like in addition to acquiring pitchers and then helping to fix them as they did here, that they also view it as a strength from which to trade given the sort of depth that they have.

So it will be interesting to see what they choose to do there. I mean, they turned Yemi Garcia into Brian De La Cruz, who is an outfielder. So it does seem like it is going to be both a reserve of strength and a reserve from which to trade. But Marlins, making some moves, Marlins. And what good is Sterling Marte to them in this particular year?

I would argue no good at all i mean like it is very nice to be able to see good hitting even on a bad baseball team but while the the nl east may have some shake-ups yet to be had i don't think that any of them involve the marlins who are currently 10 games back moving all the way up into into first place so yeah but as we've discussed multiple times this season, not a bad team. You know, bad record, but not bad run differential. And in fact, they are back into positive territory now. They have outscored their opponents by five runs entering Wednesday's games. That puts them ahead of the Mets, ahead of the Phillies, ahead of the Nationals in run differential, but certainly not in the standings. So they are still sort of, as we speak, on track for one of the worst records ever by a team with a positive run differential. And maybe trading Marte makes on the fact that they have a 44-57 record and they're going to be well out of the playoffs. They have underplayed their base runs record by nine wins, which is more than any other team this season. trade in the next couple of days here or over the off season to rob the depth to shore up the weakness of offense. And who knows, heading into next spring, it's possible that you might see the

Marlins at the very least as a sleeper, if not a strong wildcard contender. Yeah, I think that while their farm system is not as quite as highly regarded, just because mostly, I think, because of graduations at this this point as it was going into last year. Like it's middle of the pack. There's still some reinforcements to be had there. We talked about Meyer. And they just have so little money committed going on from now. There's just so little money on the books for them that they don't have to spend big, right?

Like they don't have to necessarily blow it out in free agency. They could spend some and dramatically improve their team and still have payroll that's teeny tiny. You still have a teeny tiny payroll. They should decide to just like be a good baseball team. And if that results in a bigger payroll, then okay, fine. But next year, well, Anthony bass is due three million dollars ben and then there is a seven million dollar mutual option for adam duvall which at some point do you

think they're gonna stop doing mutual options which are just like not a thing they're like a useless thing they're such a weird useless thing so there's that and then rojas has a vesting option and all of this assumes that none of these guys get traded or what have you but like there's just very little money committed here everything beyond that is arb and pre-arb guys so i think that they are like they were kind of a little interesting coming into this year just because of some of the young talent which was exciting to see and we you know we wanted to see what we were going to get inches home and like how that bat was going to develop and adapt to the majors and you know they were the surprise playoff team last year and they have all this fun pitching but i think that they're like legitimately a very interesting organization right now and i don't

know that i am going to end up penciling them in for like a wild card spot next year like you said but i wouldn't be surprised if a couple of people do, just given the strength of the pitching staff and, you know, the capacity they have to like add a couple of people. Plus, like, I have to imagine whatever small advantage location gives to a team when they are trying to sign free agents. I know we give Marlins fans guff for not going to games and they've made the ballpark kind of sterile where it used to be interesting but i have to imagine being able to sit down across from a guy and be like don't you want to live in miami like carries some amount of weight

right don't you think they're like yeah miami sounds fun like people seem to like miami i might need a seawall soon but like as it currently stands like yeah let's go check out miami so i don't know i'm i'm excited i'm excited to be excited about the marlins put it that way yeah me too where won't need a seawall soon oakland will need a seawall soon too so you know but yeah jesus cesardo is another guy obviously he was born in peru but he went to high school in the miami area in in parkland so that's sort of a semi homecoming for him too. And yeah, hopefully the Marlins can keep him healthy. It's not just his video game injury this year. It's Tommy John surgery in his past and shoulder strain. So there's sort of an extensive

checkered health record there, but hopefully the Marlins can help him out. And they just have so much pitching depth that yeah, suddenly quite an interesting team. Kim Ang has a lot to work with there. So it'll be fun to see what she does with it. And it looks like that they are, as one would expect, getting a hitter back from the Astros for Yemi Garcia, AAA outfielder, Brian De La Cruz. De La Cruz. Yeah. So just before we go here, at some point, probably before our next podcast, it seems likely that Max Scherzer will be traded. And just to lay a little groundwork for that, just because it's an interesting situation and kind of a complicated one that we can break down at greater length if and when that actually happens. But it seems to me that the old cliche about how you can never have enough pitching applies even more than usual in 2021 when you have more injuries than ever. You have tighter restrictions on workloads and usage, teams even reluctant to use relievers on back-to-back-to-back days anymore. And you also have concerns about pitchers breaking down or running out of steam just post-short season in 2020, post-sticky stuff, and any concerns about pitchers gripping the ball harder and having more fatigue. So really, everyone wants to stockpile pitching, and that's why you might see a lot of premium placed on just generic relievers or back-end

starters. And you also have Max Scherzer, who is neither one of those things. He is still a front of the rotation star. And it's pretty impressive that at age 37 and in the last year of his long-term free agent deal, he is still the most coveted arm on the market, at least in terms of 2021 performance. And really, we were talking briefly last time about Steven Strasburg and the inauspicious start to his long-term extension with the Nationals. But Scherzer's deal, regardless of how he ends the season or where he ends the season, will go down as one of the best long-term free agent signings ever, really. Ever.

long-term free agent signings ever, really. Yeah. Signing with the Nationals prior to the 2015 season, was it, that he signed a seven-year deal that I guess was called a $210 million deal, but there were all sorts of interesting circumstances and deferrals that made the real value of that probably less than that. And even if they had paid him more than that, he would have been worth every cent because he has just been fantastic. He's been exactly what they wanted.

He's been durable. He's been an ace the entire time. He's up over 1,200 innings over that span and close to 40 war could be at 40 once above replacement by the end of the season. I mean, deals don't get much better than that, especially long-term pitcher deals. I'm trying to think of any comps that worked out better. I guess Mike Messina, his signing with the Yankees, that worked out very well too,

but there just are not many in that territory. So the fact that Max Scherzer at age 37 and in the last year of that deal is not like, well, he was worth it, but he hasn't been good for the last couple of years. No, he is maybe not as good as ever, but still one of the best pitchers in the league at an advanced age. And so kudos to him and to the Nationals for that investment because it sure paid off. And also they won a World Series, which that's nice too. Yeah. I think that our analysis of free agent signings has gotten, I don't want to say more sophisticated. That's judgy in a way that I don't mean. But I think that we're a bit more holistic in sort of how we think about free agent signings than we were in like

saber 1.0 land and i think we have a better understanding of the win curve and kind of when teams want to sort of need to pay a premium to move up that curve and when it's worth it to them but if you do just like a straight dollars per war calculus and assume like an eight like assume that a win on the open market for the the whole length of scherzer's deal with washington was like eight million dollars like he's cleared his contract by almost 100 million dollars in terms of the surplus value he's created like it's just it's just been a monumentally good signing for them yeah i don't i don't know he proves he proves the point that like it really just makes good sense to invest in really good players and i understand that with pitchers in particular that kind of investment can make people both fans and

front offices nervous and not just because like they don't want to pay players but because pitchers break and so sometimes even when you really want to, you feel nervous about it because what if they blow out? And then their good years in that deal get compromised through no fault of their own just because they're doing a dumb thing that we asked them to do so many times in the course of a season. But then sometimes you get Max Scherzer, and if he decided to retire and become a youth pastor tomorrow,

he would have won almost 40 wins for them in that span. It's just really remarkable. So I don't know. I feel bad for Nationals fans that they are going to lose out on him in their uniform. But, you know, he got most of it, and he was super healthy for the duration and should help your club get better in the long term even by his lack of presence. So, yeah. I don't know.

It's so funny. The Scherzer thing is so funny because if you had asked me a week ago, do you think Max Scherzer is going to move at the deadline, I would have said no. And now I'm like, yeah, I'm really – like we have someone on Scherzer watch. Like we've got a plan at the site for when this news drops because it seems so likely to. Very strange. Yeah. Move real fast.

Earlier in the season, I mean, initially he looked unlikely to move and then he looked more likely to move. And then the Nationals went on a tear for a while and it looked like, okay, they're contenders. They could be buyers. And then they fell apart recently. And when you get swept by the Orioles in the weekend, just before the deadline, perhaps that is a sign. So that may have sort of sealed their fate there. But it's interesting because he is a 10 and five player. He has many more than 10 years in the league and more than five years with the Nationals. So he has full no-trade rights and he can veto deals. And so he has to waive those in order to accept the trade. And so any number of teams want Max

Scherzer, but based on some of the rumors and reporting, it sounds as if he has already made it known that he doesn't want to go to some of them and that his preference seemingly is one of the West Coast teams, which is quite interesting because maybe that swings the NL West race. If all of the NL West teams are interested in Max Scherzer and he is in theory interested in them, then that could be potentially a difference maker. And he has been a bit banged up and he's had a triceps issue recently. He's had some groin issues. And so you don't necessarily know that he is going to take the ball every time out for the next two months. Although a lot of what you're getting with Max Scherzer is the October ace. And so even if you're a team that doesn't necessarily

need him to put you over the top in the regular season, you might take it easy with him and rest him down the stretch just to make sure he is healthy in October when he could be a big difference maker. And in addition to all of those other considerations, so he can't get a qualifying offer after this season because he's had one in the past, which means that there's really not much incentive for the Nationals to hang on to him. They can't get a prospect back for him if he leaves. So if they want to get something other than the pleasure of watching him pitch for the next couple months, then they have to deal him now. And the salary situation is interesting too, because you look at his contract and he is making technically $34.5 million this year. And you would think, well,

some teams would be hesitant to play at that level. But it's not really that much. Yeah, it's not because you have like a third of that salary remaining for this season. And all of that money is deferred for 2028. So technically, you get Max Scherzer for free, at least for now. You don't have to pay him for a while. And it's not as much as you would think. Now, it does count against the luxury tax threshold. So I guess you take about a $12 million hit there, something like that. But it is less cost prohibitive than

it would seem just based on the actual salary. And he earns like $15 million of his $50 million signing bonus this year, but half of that money has already been paid. And the second half of it, which comes due in September, the Nationals are going to pay that even if he's no longer a National. So it's not that much money for Max Scherzer. And so lots of teams are interested in landing him. And so, yeah, you figure like if the Dodgers, the Padres, and the Giants are all going for him, I don't know who needs him more. They could all use him. He'd make them all better. But if they're all kind of bidding against each other, that gives you some extra incentive to send someone good back to the Nationals because not only are you getting him, but potentially you are preventing your direct division rival from getting him. So the Scherzer sweepstakes are pretty interesting. And there's been some reporting that suggests that they might want to get the framework of a deal in place a little bit early just to leave time for him to waive his no trade clause and coax whatever extras he might want in exchange for that. But who knows,

it could also very well come down to the wire. Well, and it'll be interesting because I imagine that he is a domino that other trades are depending on falling to fall themselves. So I, as a person who likes to spread a lot of work out over several days, advocate for it being done today so that we might then stagger the rest of the starter moves. But I know how this all works, so I expect it will happen right before actual deadline time on Friday. Yeah, I think we, at this point, the Nationals are going to be paying Max Scherzer's grandchildren.

They'll be paying the estate of Max Scherzer. But anyway, that's a conversation for another day. So like if you could pick, Ben, if you could pick a place where he was going to go, where would you send him? Oh, man. Well, I want that NL West race to be as interesting as possible and come down to the wire as much as possible.

So I guess from that perspective, it would be maybe most fun if he went to the third place team, the Padres. That'd be pretty fun. Or I don't know. I could also see, you know, he'd fit in really well with the ancient giants too. I love the idea of the giants getting 37-year-old reinforcement. I love the idea of the Giants getting 37-year-old reinforcement. And, you know, even though they are in first place now, there's still some skepticism about whether they are actually the best team or the second best team in that division. So you get some insurance against any regression that still could be coming there. So, you know, kind of growing on me, the idea of Scherzer to the Giants.

I know they've been talking to teams about Chris Bryant and others as well. I love the idea of him on the Giants. I do like that Max Scherzer, I know that it's because he is trying to insert himself into competitive races that the team list has narrowed to what it is. But I like to think it's because Max Scherzer has realized that the Pacific time zone is the best time zone for watching other sports. And he just wants to sit here and be able to go to bed at a reasonable hour. I think that that might be the answer. Yeah. Have a super intense ace to take the place of Madison Baumgartner. That would feel appropriate too. Yeah. I'm kind of feeling the Giants and Scherzer.

I like that match. Yeah. But we will see. Our tentative plan is potentially actually to record Saturday, perhaps semi-early on Saturday, depending on how things go down. I guess if the deadline is a total dud and not much happens on Friday, we could record then. But if it is busy and if we are writing and editing and everything is frantic, then we may just allow the dust to settle and convene early on Saturday to do a little recap. and convene early on Saturday to do a little recap. But we'll see how things go and lots of big names potentially being dangled.

Joey Gallo, Kyle Gibson, Chris Bryant, Josh Donaldson, Trevor Story, Jose Barrios, John Gray, John Means, Herman Marquez, and others. Not all of those guys will be moved, but some of them will be moved as well as Scherzer potentially. So stay tuned and also stay tuned for the second segment on this episode with Neil Payne from FiveThirtyEight. Keep in mind, this was recorded on Wednesday morning. I don't think anything weird Neil said will be dramatically out of date. But if anything breaks between when we are saying this and when you hear this,

just keep in mind when it was recorded. But we'll talk to Neil about how you determine which tack to take at the deadline and how aggressive you should be. Well, all the apostles, they're sitting in swing Saying I'd sell off my savior for a set of new rings And some sandals with the style of straps That cling best to the arrow So all of the businessmen

In unlimited hell Where they buy and they sell And they sell all their trash To each other So they're sick of it all And they're bankrupt on selling All right, it is time to talk about which teams should do what

at the trade deadline. And to do that, we are joined by the proficient and prolific Neil Payne, senior writer for FiveThirtyEight, who covers every sport, really, but baseball maybe foremost among them. Technically, he is on vacation, having had the foresight to take off trade deadline week. Wish we had thought of that. But he is joining us nevertheless. Hello, Neil. Hey, thanks, Ben. Thanks, Meg, for having me. And yeah, it's kind of a busy week to be on the road, but I want to take some time to talk to you guys because I am really excited for the trade deadline. I think it should be a really fun one by comparison with some of the ones that we've had

recently. Yeah. So one of the big questions at this point in the season is always who should be buyers? Who should be sellers? Who should be most motivated or least motivated to make a deal? And that can be sort of a subjective question. And there are all sorts of factors that come into play, but you work for FiveThirtyEight, so you have a number for that. And there is a formula and a stat that I believe you and Nate Silver introduced back in 2015 called the Doyle number, which is intended to tell us who should be buyers and who should be sellers and how aggressive they should be. So tell us a little bit about the Doyle number. And this is a Fangraphs podcast. So feel free to get as deep into the weeds as you would like.

That's right. Yeah. So the Doyle number, it is not an acronym like most of our things like Carmelo and Raptor and all these things. Pakoda, I guess, for old time baseball followers. But yeah, Doyle is a reference to Doyle Alexander, who was traded for John Smoltz in one of the all time sort of like short sighted thinking versus long sighted thinking of, you know, we want someone, a veteran to contribute down the stretch of a season. So we're going to give up this prospect and hope that it doesn't bite us down the line. And of course, the Tigers got a pretty good rest of the regular season from Doyle Alexander after making that trade, but then not so much in the playoffs, not so much after that. And of course, John Smoltz went on to become a Hall of Famer and one of the best pitchers ever. So we named it after that trade because the idea of the number is essentially trying to figure out that balance

between how all in do you go for this season at the expense of future seasons. And the number itself represents essentially how many future wins you should give up of talent for each win that you add this season to your talent base. So a number of one would mean that you are kind of indifferent. You could give up talent in the future to acquire something this season, or you could be a seller and acquire things for the future at the expense of this season. But if you are above one, that means that you should think about putting a premium on this year and not necessarily thinking about an equal trade in terms of like total war received in versus out but put a lot of emphasis on this year because you're in a good position to try to make a run at the World Series and then as

you approach a Doyle number of zero or even under one that means that you should actually put more of a premium on future wins and prospects. And that means selling if you can this season. And one of the interesting things that came out of our research was this idea, you know, for the longest time, there was the idea that the teams that should be most focused on buying at the deadline should be teams that are really on the brink of making the playoffs and trying to look for that one player that puts you over the top and gets you in. And then the playoffs being the crapshoot that they are, you kind of take your chances once you get in. And one of the counterintuitive

things that came out of our research was that's actually not true. The teams with the highest Doyle numbers, so for instance, this season are the Dodgers and the Astros and then followed by the White Sox and the Rays and the Brewers and the Red Sox and the Giants. So you have teams that we think of as being like the top contenders and maybe don't need that much to kind of put them over the top, certainly not to make the playoffs. The Dodgers have almost a 100% chance of making the playoffs, as is the case with a lot of those teams that I just mentioned, they're not looking for that extra piece to push them over the top to get into the playoffs. But we found that really baseball being the way it is, that there is essentially no diminishing returns to talent added to your roster, the relationship between talent added to your roster and your

World Series probability. Because again, it is kind of a crapshoot and it is random, but the benefit of adding talent to a team, say you're a 95-win talent team, and you have the chance to add five wins. That's a little bit unrealistic for most trade deadlines. But say you could add yourself five extra wins. There really isn't a diminishing return to that. If you could somehow get 10 wins, that would increase almost linearly your World Series probability as you kind of go up that talent ladder. So really the implication

of the Doyle number, one of the big ones, is that the teams that should be most aggressive and looking to upgrade are the teams that are the biggest contenders and really are in the best position to kind of make that flag fly forever if they can add that extra talent and increase their World Series odds commensurately. One thing that I think Ben and I have talked a lot about that we're always curious about, and I'm curious on your take, which is the timing of this is a little bit different than what you have looked at, but we're always curious when exactly teams should be upgrading. We focus on the deadline because it's this firm deadline after which, especially now, teams cannot make trades. But in your research, is there anything to the idea of teams trying to shore up rosters that have obvious holes

earlier in the season rather than waiting for the deadline so that they might accrue some of that benefit, you know, over a longer stretch rather than just in the second half? Yeah, I haven't looked at the numbers on that specifically, because again, we did focus all this research on the deadline specifically. It's a very unfair question of me. No, it's fine, because I do think that probably the more, like we're talking about wins of talent, right? So that's kind of wins per 162 games. But you can only exert that if you make that trade on deadline day. You're not exerting that over 162 games. You're really only exerting it over the last couple months of the regular season and then the playoffs. And of course,

the playoffs take on sort of an amplified importance, especially in this metric, because again, we're focusing on the World Series probability. But I think earlier also gives you, I guess it cuts both ways, right? Because the deadline being what it is does create this such a leverage point where you have all the information that you can possibly gather about your team by that point. And like you said, especially now with a waiver deadline not existing anymore, this is the last chance. You really have to kind of wait around and gather that information, but everybody else does too. And so that I think sort of informs the market

and maybe the waiting till the deadline makes the prices for each player a lot more firm and well known because the market is very focused on that date. Whereas earlier, maybe there's chances for arbitrage, both good and bad, where you could kind of make a deal that looks better for you, but you're working with incomplete information. So there's a lot more uncertainty, I guess. If you like uncertainty and you have an appetite for that, and maybe that lends into those teams that might be lower on the World Series odds list, but around that cusp of the playoffs, they might use that to work to their advantage because they're the teams that have a little bit more of a risk-reward type, you know, the later stages of the season.

They might have more of a tolerance for risk earlier in the season. 538 projects a lot of outcomes. Some are political, some are sporting events. And I know that as a site, as a staff, 538 devotes a lot of energy to looking back at its own projections and trying to figure out if they're properly calibrated. So if the site says that an NBA team or an MLB team or a Senate candidate or whatever has a 60% chance to win, then on the whole, do those 60% chance to win people or teams win 60% of the time? And for the most part, I think things shake out fairly well. This is not a projection per se. This is just saying who should be buyers and sellers, not necessarily whether they will. But I wonder whether you've looked back at all at whether it actually predicts who does buy and sell because we can get into some of the specific teams and Doyle numbers for the season soon. But, you know, there are some teams that Doyle number would say you should sell who probably will be buyers

or have already been buyers. So there are other factors that influence whether teams follow the numbers, you know, the model that you have constructed there. So it might be interesting to look back and see, well, did teams in certain situations that in theory on paper should have been sellers actually buy and what predicts

that? Yeah. And that's a great idea and something for me to look at down the line, because I do think that that's a good idea to look at it. In my sort of anecdotal, you know, we invented this stat, I want to say 2015. So we've been doing it for a while now and have a decent sample of years. So sort of in my mind, anecdotally, I do feel like there still is that element of the teams that are on the cusp of the playoffs being a little bit more aggressive than Doyle would tell them to be. And maybe the teams that are the bigger favorites being less aggressive. I think that that has been true over the years. And there's always one or two teams that are sort of, like you said, in that situation where maybe the number says, maybe you should think about selling, but they've had an unexpectedly good first half of the season. Or a lot of times also it's that archetype of a team that maybe had an unexpectedly not good first half of the season, but they've spent a lot. They made a big push, particularly maybe over the previous offseason, and they added payroll.

And so they're feeling pressures that aren't being captured by this number. But I think it's interesting, like the Mariners, for instance, as we saw with Kendall Graveman being traded just, I think it was yesterday, just recently, that that's a situation where they at least sold him. Now, Jerry DiPoto has said there are potentially a lot more interesting trades coming down the line. And knowing him, I trust him that there will be that. But just on its face, that is a move where maybe in the past, we would have seen a Mariners team that has really exceeded expectations and is right in the thick of that race, at least in the standings in the first half, make a move to buy, even though

their Doyle number would say, hey, you guys may not be as good as your record would indicate and you should sell. So I think that is an interesting trade. Again, we'll see what else they have brewing. But just in the sense of that's one where I would have expected them to defy the Doyle number based on just the history of doing this. And it seems like at least with that move, they're following it, but I guess we'll see how it shakes out overall. Yeah. The Doyle number model doesn't include a flag for, is Jerry DePoto your general manager? It should. I should add that to the model next year.

And have you made the playoffs in the past 20 years? You can add a Preller flag while you're at it. Yes. I should add that to the model next year. And have you made the playoffs in the past 20 years? Yeah, that too. You can add a Preller flag while you're at it. Yes. Teams refer to this in a number of different ways. Some are straightforward in calling it tanking. Others engage in soft rebuilds or resets or step backs. But I'm curious how the phenomena of teams trying less hard to win than they might, let's use that as a catch-all

here, has impacted the market for you and has sort of manifested itself in the Doyle numbers. Because I imagine that there are perhaps more active sellers in some years than we might assume just when you'd see a season observed sort of a normal season dynamic by virtue of the fact that there are teams that are trying to position themselves for a favorable draft position or what have you. Obviously, every market needs sellers in order for there to be active buyers. But I'm curious what the phenomena of tanking has done for this. That definitely has changed things since we started doing it because in 2015, really, you didn't have like a heavily stratified structure across baseball. If anything, that was sort of a year of extreme parity. And if we think

back, I mean, we had the Mets and the Royals in the World Series, and it was just like a very different time than we saw just a few years later, where you had these sort of super teams, like the Dodgers and the Astros and the Red Sox and the Yankees were in that conversation for sure. So yeah, I do think in 2018, which was sort of the peak or one of the peak years of the stratified world of baseball and the tank fest and all this stuff, we did see a kind of a pronounced effect where there were fewer teams in that middle area. And there were teams that Doyle, of course, because it loves the top tier teams and says that they should buy and add on and kind of press their advantage.

You saw teams with really unusually high Doyle numbers, like a number over two. Usually you would see only maybe like one team have that or be in that neighborhood. And that would be the top team by the Doyle number. But in 2018, for instance, we saw three teams over 2.1 and then a bunch of other teams that were above 1.8. So it definitely showed up in the stratification. And then, of course, a bunch of teams down at the bottom that Doyle said, you should not under any circumstances buy and you should try to sell as much as possible. But to your point, Meg, and it's a great one, Doyle sort of assumes that there will be buyers and sellers kind of find partners and shake things out that way. But if you do have

this extreme split between the buyers and the sellers and the tanking kind of feeds into that, it can be harder to find those pairings. And that creates friction in the market too. And that's something that's not really picked up. But one of the things that I always try to do when I've written about it in the past is also just look at like the farm system, you know, rankings for the teams that have the high Doyle numbers and just say, do these teams have anyone to even give away in order to buy? You have to have that grist for the mill for the system to work. And that, I think, has been made more difficult by the phenomenon of tanking and teams sort of splitting off into this heavily stratified structure.

Yeah. And that's very relevant this season because our former 538 colleague Rob Arthur wrote at Baseball Prospectus on Tuesday an article titled, The Playoff Chase is Mostly Over. And by that, he meant that the playoff field seems sort of set. Of course, there are still teams jockeying for position and seeding and whether they're winning a division or winning a wildcard. But I'll just read a little bit from Rob's piece here, jumping around in the article. Although there are still two months of baseball yet to be played, the playoff field looks

more or less set. Indeed, the season as a whole has been one of the more settled in recent memory, with few tight races and not much jostling between contenders. An analysis of playoff odds data from Pakoda shows that there has been much less uncertainty about the postseason field this year than in any recent season except 2018. This is part of a longer-term trend toward less exciting playoff races going back to 2013. We're at the lowest level of playoff uncertainty at this date in the time we have data. As we approach the deadline, that static playoff picture creates a trade market ideal for buyers.

Very few teams need extra help, although as the Padres demonstrated, many would take it for the right price. But with so few teams on the bubble, buyers can dictate their own packages, leaving selling teams, many of them mid-rebuild, unable to acquire nearly as much value. It's a great time to be one of the dominant teams in MLB, but it's an awful time to be tanking.

And that lack of teams on the bubble that Rob picked up on also shows up in the Doyle numbers for this season. And we will make accessible a spreadsheet that you've sent to us. We'll link on the show page to the Doyle numbers for all of the teams this season and some of the underlying calculations that go into it. But it looks like there is also a lack of teams in that middle ground here. So compared to past deadlines, how does the overall Doyle number picture shake out? Yeah, you're totally right.

And Rob makes a great point about that. The playoff race is being settled. That has a huge impact on the Doyle number. So right now there are nine teams that have a Doyle number over one, which means that's kind of your group of buyers, at least by the numbers. But the lowest of those teams, the Mets, have a Doyle of 1.3. So usually in most years, you see teams that are like at like 1.01 or something, you know, 1.1 or 1.2 in that range. And those are teams that still, you know, by the numbers should be

buying, but it's a little bit less clear. Whereas now every team is above 1.3. And in fact, if you go up one notch from the Mets, you find the Pad sort of 1.3 or higher. But then if you look down below the Mets, the 10th ranked team by Doyle is the A's at 0.65. So really, in my experience of doing this, and again, I don't have the number exactly off the top of my head, but it is exceptionally rare. I can't remember another time where there was that big gulf between the lowest team over one, again, the Mets at 1.32, and then the highest team under one, which is the A's at

0.65. Usually you will have at least maybe like five teams or six or even more in that range between 0.6 and 1.3. And that stands especially in stark contrast to last year, because last year's trade deadline was one of the weirdest ever as well in maybe the opposite direction, since it was the shortened season and it happened at a different date. And you had just so many more teams. The expanded playoffs also fed into this. So many more teams that were in that gray area between buyer and seller. So last year year we had an abnormal number of teams in that range between like 0.6 and 1.3. This year we have no teams in that range, or I guess technically we have one. It's the A's in there at 0.65. So really it's this huge gulf between buyers and sellers. And I think that

directly comes from what Rob wrote about, which is that a lot of the playoff races are basically settled. We know who most of these teams are going to be. And for the teams where there is uncertainty. So for instance, we don't know who's necessarily going to win the NL East right now. You know, the Mets have probably the best odds, but they're still, you know, the Braves and the Phillies. And I guess maybe the Nationals, although they seem to be sort of falling out of that and accepting the reality of their situation. But even in that case where it's like, OK, this is a good playoff race, but it's totally a race for the division. There's almost no chance that the wild cards in the NL come from anywhere but the NL West.

And so really you see that that plays into, since this is based on World Series odds and not just about do I technically make the wild card game, but it's really about, no, you have to not just do that, but you have to go deep into the playoffs. And we're calculating off of that, that even the races where there is a little intrigue, those are sort of like trying to figure out, OK, well, I'm going to win this

division. And then they're really it's that or bust, basically. And so, yeah, I think that all of that is playing into this. Again, it's another kind of stratified type of market. And I do think that that makes things easier for trading, though, in the sense that you don't have those teams that are on the fence and sort of thinking about things and not sure and sort of holding up the market. Whereas now it's like, well, we know who the buyers are and we know who the sellers are with almost no exceptions. And so it's just like, let's get down to brass tacks and start trying to make deals. We can do this earlier because there is certainty about which teams fit into each category. Yeah, the teams with the highest sub one Doyle numbers are either in the running for the NL

East division title or for basically the second AL wildcard slot. So A's, Yankees, Braves, Phillies, Blue Jays, Mariners, those are the six teams there at the top in the quote-unquote seller's camp, according to Doyle number, although many of them will probably be buyers. But you sort of anticipated my next question there, which was whether these stratified standings and the clarity of the playoff picture

makes it more or less likely for moves to be made. As you said, I guess there are fewer teams maybe waiting to July 30th in this case to say, where are we and do we have a realistic shot? On the other hand, as you mentioned earlier, it seems like those teams that are kind of on the bubble maybe historically have been the ones that have been most active or at least more active than their Doyle number would dictate so I guess if you are the Dodgers or the Astros or someone in the Astros have already made a trade and the Dodgers have been shorthanded a lot of the year despite their solid place in the standings though they're not running away with the NOS as they were figured to but I wonder whether the fact that those teams are at the top and say,

we can count on being in the playoffs. And as you said, maybe they should still upgrade, but maybe might not be quite as motivated as the team that feels like it's fighting for its playoff life. So I wonder how those two things kind of produce either an active or slow deadline. And those things are kind of at cross purposes, especially since we got to talk about the Yankees being in there as the second highest

team in the group of sellers. Their season as a whole has been so fascinating and just like mind boggling anyway. So I don't know necessarily like the idea of the Yankees being sellers is always something that kind of raises eyebrows. And I should also say that in Doyle, so, you know, we have the basic number, which represents sort of the all else being equal, how many wins of future talent you should give up for one win added of talent this season. But it does change a little bit based on how much you might add. So, for instance, if the Yankees can somehow add eight wins of talent, again, I don't know where they're going to find eight wins of talent, especially in this market or whatever, but their Doyle number for adding that would be 0.93. So there is sort of a sliding scale between adding and subtracting talent where it's sort of like,

almost like, hey, if you squint, you can kind of see a situation under which it does make sense for the Yankees to be buyers. And that's something that we kind of built into the system because it does reflect this idea that playoff odds and World Series odds especially, they're not necessarily linear in terms of the relationship between talent and especially talent that you add over a very specific, like you mentioned, Meg, the last two months of the season is a very specific amount of time that you've already front loaded a lot of games that play into your playoff and World Series odds. And so really, it's about that interplay between how much a boost in talent can kind of make your odds change over the last two months of the regular season. And then if you do make the playoffs, and in the case of the Yankees, probably not. But, you know, conditional on making the playoffs, the Yankees would, at least in our model, because we're very slow and this is borne out by research and a lot of people

have questions about like well why do the Yankees still have an ELO rating that ranks so highly I think they're fifth in ELO when we've seen a lot of evidence that this team is you know they might be okay but they're certainly not you know as good as projected going into the season and it's because it takes a large sample of baseball games to know about the true quality of a team. And even at this point in the season, we've adjusted the Yankees downward, but maybe not as downward as a lot of Yankee fans or Yankee haters would from watching this team play day in and day out. But that's another case where it's like conditional on making the playoffs and getting into the Wildcard game and especially getting into

the division series. Maybe the Yankees look scary, especially if they do add someone, you know, maybe not eight war worth of talent, but if they add someone. So I think that that also plays into it as well. And you have some teams in that grouping that the same could be said about the A's and the Braves, even though they lost to Cunha. You know, they're still seem to making a push, and maybe rightly so, given the fact that the Mets haven't run away with that division. And then the Phillies are desperate to make the playoffs.

So you have a lot of teams in that group that may be conditional on making the playoffs. They could be scary, and they could kind of justify adding something, even though their basic Doyle number says you probably shouldn't do this. This is going to be futile and not end well for you. But those are the teams that are in that kind of playoff cusp, but they maybe have the talent if they do make the playoffs to maybe be scarier than their Doyle number is giving them credit for. Maybe now we can talk about some of the teams that are sort of on that high list from a buyer perspective, the ones that the Doyle number says should be active in the market,

and also what it is that they need. Because we talk about wins as sort of fungible, right? We want to add eight or five or however many. But teams go into the deadline with specific rosters already in hand and with specific roster needs sort of in mind, right? Like I'm in the market for a starter. I'm the Astros and I am super excited. I got that reliever that I really needed to shore up my bullpen. So what, what are the numbers indicate to you in terms of who should be active in the next couple of days and what, what should they be after? Well, yeah. So the

Astros, I think also with the Kendall Graveman deal, that kind of played into not only the idea that they should be buying and adding talent, even though they are very high in the playoff odds, but also where they should be adding it because their bullpen has been at least if. Can I talk about baseball reference war? I'm sorry to bring that up on this podcast. It's OK. But but, you know, I have kind of downloaded their numbers. I'll make it up to you guys later. I'll use fan graphs next time. But anyway, they're below replacement so far this season in terms of their relief pitching more on the season. So you totally understand why that was an area of concern. I think for the Dodgers too, I mean, they have some

other holes, but I think relief pitching has been sort of an issue for them this season as well. And so, you know, who doesn't need relief pitching as we go toward the trade deadline? So I think that that's kind of a common area of upgrade that you can kind of look at for teams. You know, for the White Sox, they are still kind of struggling from just a depth outfield perspective after some of the injuries that they suffered earlier in the season and they've been great despite that but um you know that might be something to kick the tires on and then the raise i i don't know about you guys but i think it kind of threw people a little bit for a loop when they traded away rich hill because starting pitching was kind of an issue

for them and i guess they're trying to sort of see what they have already. You know, they have depth of people that might contribute, even if they have not necessarily contributed as much, you know, demonstrably this season. But maybe that's another area where they go out and they try to find a starter, you know, even though they just dealt away a starter. So to me, those are the big teams in terms of the Doyleyle number the teams above 1.7 that are like really pushing their chips into the middle of the table and yeah those are areas i guess where they might target adding people i mean the giants are fascinating as well because none of us really thought they would be in this situation and that's been true the giants have been the doyle number

like anti-darlings i don't even know what you want to call it. Consistently over the past, I want to say three years or maybe even longer, where every single time and this year they have a Doyle above one. So, you know, it makes sense even by the numbers, it would be endorsed for them to kind of go all in to try to win the World Series. series. But they've tried to kind of make deals at the deadline to go in, even when maybe their talent didn't necessarily dictate that each of the past couple of years, but they got out to really great starts. So, you know, I'm interested always in what they do around the deadline because Doyle and them don't always see eye to eye. Yeah. So the nine teams well above that line, as you mentioned, the Dodgers, Astros, White Sox, Rays, Brewers, Red Sox, Giants, Padres, Mets. Now the Mets are technically the closest team to one on either side of one. And you are a Mets fan and a former Mets podcaster. So you have an intimate knowledge of this team and its needs. What do you think they should do? What would you like them to do? Well, I mean, I wonder how much of it they of their upgrading they've sort of

already done, like pre deadline or last offseason or whatever, you know, I think that they've certainly spent a lot on trying to kind of upgrade the team already. And some of the moves have not necessarily had the fully desired results so far. But I do think, I think that they're a team that you mentioned that sort of like, well, teams have needs and we like to think about we're all kind of going in one bucket, but that's not always true. But I do think that the Mets are one of those teams where there are a lot of different places where they could just add incrementally. And really, especially the NL East being what it is. Again, it is division or bust for all those teams because they're almost certainly not going to vie for the wild card.

Like the NL West is so strong and the runner up and the runner up to the runner up there will almost certainly be the wild card teams. And so really it is about trying to provide that cushion. And, you know, if you look at war, the Mets have, they're kind of been punching above their weight in terms of where they are right now in the playoff race, even if that's because their players have not necessarily always lived up to what we would have projected for them going into the season. But I do think that, yeah, the bullpen could use some help. They also could use, you know, help in terms of another bat. And certainly just they need more out of the players that they've asked a lot of also, I think so far. And I'm kind of expecting maybe a little more positive

regression to the mean as we approach the stretch run. But yeah, that's kind of my take on the Mets right now. Yeah. And they seem like maybe the most likely team for someone associated with that organization to say that the biggest deadline addition was some guy that got back from the intro to a strike. That is like kind of, yeah, I think that that and maybe rightly so, you know, I think sometimes that is how front offices package things to try to kind of explain and provide cover for why they didn't do more. But in the Mets case, there are a lot of guys on the injured list, perhaps a biblical number of guys on the injured list at different times during the season. So I think in some ways that will go a long way toward that kind of positive regression as well. Yeah, you get Carlos Carrasco back, you get Noah Syndergaard back, or maybe one of the other players who's come and gone over the first half.

That would actually be a pretty big boost. And I wonder of the teams that are below the Doyle line, but certainly seem like they are inclined to be buyers. So we've seen the A's already add Andrew Chafin from the Cubs. like they are inclined to be buyers. So we've seen the A's already add Andrew Chafin from the Cubs. The Yankees dealt away a couple of relievers on Tuesday, but that seems like it's probably a prelude to adding in some other area. And then the Phillies were trying to trade for Tyler Anderson from the Pirates before the Mariners eventually landed him.

Then you have the Mariners who they did get Anderson. And technically, according to Doyle number, they are in the same spot as the Blue Jays and that's another interesting team because they're out of the playoff picture right now but that's a team that was extremely aggressive over the winter was involved in every potential trade and signing ended up making a number of them and there's a lot of excitement surrounding that team right now so even if they are technically underdogs when it comes to the playoff picture now, I think their fans would be pretty disappointed if they didn't do something. So of those five or six teams there that are below the line, which do you think is most likely to defy the Doyle number? the Doyle number? Well, yeah, I think the Yankees come to mind. Like you mentioned,

they made that deal to it seemed like pretty obviously to kind of clear the path for for something bigger. And we just don't think of the Yankees as being sellers almost ever. So I don't think that they will follow Doyle's advice. And again, they we have them at a 41 percent chance to make the playoffs. And again, that's just to sort of get their foot in the door of the playoffs. Only a 3% chance to win the World Series. But again, conditional on making the playoffs, that number probably would go up by a bit. I also think one of the interesting things, you mentioned the Blue Jays and the Mariners.

Those are almost like two mirror image teams of each other where it's like the Mariners were not expected to be good and talent wise probably aren't as good as they've played. Yet they're in the mix. And that's traditionally kind of an archetype of a team that might buy and try to sort of shore themselves up and hang on to that playoff positioning. And then the Blue Jays were a team that were expected to be better than they've been. And, you know, they faced a really tough schedule and, you know, it's been tough in that division, I think, in general. But, you know, they're a team that have players that maybe could be attractive, although, you know, most of their stars are too young to be in this conversation about trading. But they typify maybe a number of unusual number of teams that are in this low Doyle category this year of teams that were supposed to be better. They have names. They have talent on hand. I think about the Nationals. I think about the Cubs, maybe especially the Cubs. The Twins are in this conversation too. But there's an unusual number of these teams that haven't had

good seasons, disappointing seasons, but they have players that are attractive to the teams that are higher on the Doyle pecking order. And I think that's another thing that greases the wheels for trades this year, maybe more than the average year, on top of just that certainty of knowing who's in each camp, is that maybe an unusual number of teams low on the totem pole have players that could be impactful, especially in the postseason. I wanted to ask about the Mariners, not specifically the Mariners, but sort of teams like them that are viewed as being on the cusp of their next

competitive window, right? They have a rich farm system. They have young prospects they're excited about. They have a couple guys on the major league roster who they perhaps anticipate being part of the next good iteration of their team. And if you've noticed any sort of behavioral trends for teams like that, where their Doyle number might sit in sort of an in-between place between buying and selling, but they do anticipate a really good team sort of on the horizon. Is there a way that those teams typically behave around deadline time? I think that that's an example of a team that has sort of changed more toward the future

looking approach than the let's go in this season type of approach than maybe when we started doing this. Because I think as teams get, you know, frankly, a little more rational and more realistic about their chances in a given season, they're going to sort of say like, hey, we're doing wildly better than expected this season in Seattle. But how much of that is going to, you know, fall off as we go down the stretch of the season? How much damage can we really realistically do even if we got into the playoffs? damage can we really realistically do even if we got into the playoffs? And so maybe it makes sense to look ahead to the future, like you said, double down on some of these guys that are going to be part of the next great Mariners team. I think in the past, we would have been more inclined to see

a team that finds themselves in the situation where they're unexpectedly right in the playoff mix and be like, yeah, we are legitimately this good because you are what your record says you are. And so we're going to give up future assets to try to make this run this season and then see it go badly as the numbers sort of predict that it probably will. So I think if anything, yeah, as we've seen sort of front offices take a more realistic eye to where they are at the deadline, we're seeing a trend toward teams in this situation of unexpectedly being good, maybe being a little more conservative about how much they,

they go all in to try to do something this season, despite their record. Cause the Mariners again have, have been great. And I've kind of been predicting regression for them for a while and they haven't done that yet. So maybe it's on me, you know,

maybe I'm the one with the problem. But I don't think I'm alone among you guys and the various sabermetric folks out there. Well, we will let you get back to your vacation. Although while we have you, I just wanted to thank you in person for the research that you did about true talent in baseball and in various other sports, which you mentioned earlier on this episode. But I've probably linked to your research on that and cited it on this podcast more than just about anything else. So if you've noticed an unusual number of hits going to your 2014 article about the Diamondbacks slow start and what it says about- I know that article. I have linked that article as well.

It's very handy to point out, this is how long you need to tell what true talent is of a baseball I have linked that article as well. He has an ongoing series called the Hall of Good, where he highlights some players who are not Hall of Famers but deserve to be saluted for some reason or another. He just inducted Hideo Nomo into that class this week. And, of course, he has Olympics coverage up and Olympics medal projections and some recent-ish trade deadline writing. July 16th, this trade deadline could break up the Cubs almost dynasty. And you took a look at which teams should be buyers and sellers in late June, although the playoff picture has changed since then. But as noted, we will link to the spreadsheet where you can find all the Doyle number numbers and you can find Neil on Twitter at Neil underscore pain. You can hear him on five 38 sports podcast, hot takedown every week and find

his writing at five 38.com. And now you can just sit back and enjoy the deadline without having to blog about it. So that sounds nice. Well, thank you both for having me. It was a joy to talk to you both, obviously big fans of the work that you guys do and a fan graphs in general. And like I said, next time I'll use fan graphs were instead of baseball reference. I try to keep it balanced. You know, it's like trying to choose, you know, which of your children is your favorite. You know, I can't make that choice. I love both sites and try to kind of keep them.

And I used to do the Jeff Bagwell war, which was the averaging of the two together, which was the joint estimate featuring fan graphs and baseball reference aggregate equally leveling lists or something like that. So that, by the way, it's a total coincidence that that came out to spell Jeff Bagwell. Well, we have, we have nothing but affection for the folks over at BRF and NBP for that matter. So I, I will never begrudge you using other sites stuff, though I do prefer mine, obviously. Well, thanks again.

Well, since Meg and I talked about the trade talks surrounding Max Scherzer and the Nationals at the start of this episode, there's been some news not about trades, but about COVID cases. The Nationals have an outbreak on their hands, 12 total positive cases, including Trey Turner. There are four players and eight staff members. Apparently 11 of the 12 have been vaccinated, and it sounds as if no one is seriously symptomatic, which is good, but obviously the Nationals have more on their minds right now than trading Max Scherzer or anyone else, though I'm sure they're still working on that. So we don't know how that could complicate the trade talks. We

do know that the Nationals-Phillies game on Wednesday has been postponed. As I mentioned, we'll be back with one more episode later this week to wrap up all of the trades that happened between now and the deadline, but please continue to check fangraphs in the intervening period. All of the trades will be blogged about. There will also be live streams on Twitch on Thursday and Friday throughout most of the day, so just check the homepage to find all of that coverage, and we will be back to break it all down before the end of the week. In the meantime, you can can also support effectively wild on patreon by going to patreon.com slash effectively wild the following five listeners have already signed up and pledged some small monthly amount to help keep the podcast going and get themselves access to some perks regina hogel aaron danielson joe

morelli michael hank and allison thanks to all of you you can rate review and subscribe to effectively wild on itunes and spotify and other podcast platforms you. You can rate, review, and subscribe to Effectively Wild on iTunes and Spotify and other podcast platforms. You can join our Facebook group at facebook.com slash group slash Effectively Wild, where a lot of our listeners will be discussing and debating trades throughout all hours of the day and night.

Please keep your questions and comments for me and Meg coming via email at podcastfancrafts.com or via the Patreon messaging system if you are a supporter. Thanks to Dylan Higgins for his editing assistance, and we will be back to talk to you soon. Enjoy the trade deadline. I can sell you love.

I can buy you the morning sun.