Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 291: Hanley After Age 30/Next Year’s Playoff Picture

Episode Date: September 20, 2013

Ben and Sam discuss Hanley Ramirez’s season and future, then talk about various teams’ chances to make it to October in 2014 (and beyond).

I sold everything but these cucumbers. Now what am I going to do? We can pickle that! Hi, I'm Bryce Shivers. And I'm Lisa Eversman. And we can pickle that! Good morning and welcome to episode 291 of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast from Baseball Perspectives.

Sorry, I just saw something funny. It's me, Sam Miller. Good intro. Thanks. And that's Ben Lindberg. Ben, how are you? I'm okay. I'm a little sleepy. We're going to get this done. All right. What do you want to talk about today? All right, what do you want to talk about today? My new topic is going to be about which contenders or which playoff teams are most future-proof.

Don't know what that means. Like, which ones have the highest chance to be back or to remain playoff teams for a while. Okay. And I want to talk about, just briefly, the Marlins and Hanley Ramirez kind of two separate things. Okay. But sort of related. I have a trivia question for you. Okay.

Is it a trivia question? I'm going to try to guess it, or we're going to throw it out there. You don't have to guess the question, but I'll tell you the question. The question is, how many pitchers through a pitch 100 miles per hour this season? I'm going to say seven. Sixteen. That's a lot yeah there was an article in the times the other day

did you see the one with Glenn Fleissig and Graham Goldbeck from Sport Vision talking about how pitchers have reached their maximum velocity but that the low end is still rising there's not going to be a new velocity record broken every year, but the, the slowest throwers are throwing harder. Um, so there are still more people topping whatever speed benchmark you want to use.

I didn't see that and I'm very surprised that that's not your topic. Uh, yeah, I don't know. I don't have that much more to say about it. I just summarized it. But 16... What is the... I remember reading a... I think I remember reading a Sports Illustrated piece about maybe six or seven years ago

that theorized that nobody could ever throw more than 106. Well, no one has. At the time, nobody had ever thrown 105 or 104 either. It had something to do with the human rotator cuff or something. Who's going to... I won't make you name the 100-mile-per-hour people. We can continue. Yeah, I wonder how many I could name.

I don't want to because it would take too long, but maybe after the show, maybe I'll try it. Okay, no one else gets to hear it. No, you could post the results on the Facebook page. Okay, all right. So the Marlins, just two things about them. One, Hanley Ramirez, he's having a phenomenal year. Everybody knows he's having a phenomenal year. He played his 81st game

yesterday though, which people love the 81 game. I don't know. People love 81 games because it's easy. You just double, right? So yesterday he played his 81st game and he is like a five win player right now.

Yeah. Even on our site, he's a five-win player. And so that basically means that he's been Mike Trout. And he was basically an afterthought after his second down year. Last year, he's not anymore. There's MVP talk about him, even though, I mean, I think there's in the conversation talk about him, which is not the same thing, even though he's only played 81 games. And I never know what to do with a guy like this, where you hear that he's benefited from the change of scenery. You know, you hear about, you know about how he needed to get out of Florida

and the situation in LA is so much better for him and that's what's really brought him back to his incredible talent level that he had previously demonstrated. And I always don't know whether this encourages me or not because if it really is that he just is that sort of dependent on his mood um then on the one hand you think okay so he really does have this this potential this this

talent level that he can tap into uh you know at any time if he's in a good mood but then if if you really believe that then it feels like he's always just like a bad day away from being out of it. I just feel like a human being's happiness is just not something that we're really able to control very much. It feels like you have your own natural level. I've been trying to make myself happier for decades. No matter what I do, no matter what changes I make in my life or what new habits I try to break or start, you basically end up right where you started after about two days. It's exhausting to try to change your mood or your tempo. My guess is that if I were a GM and somebody said, Hanley just needed to get out of Florida, he couldn't thrive when he was in Florida,

I think that might be a red flag to me, thinking, well, it'll be a month before I'm Florida too, and he just needs to get out of me. So he's not a free agent this year. He's got one more year, which makes that trade look even more incredible for the Dodgers. I think he's going to make like $14 million or something next year. look even more incredible for the Dodgers.

I think he's going to make like $14 million or something next year. But I guess the question is, if he were a free agent, would you, as a GM, would you rate him? What would you think of him if you were a GM? How much would this year outweigh the previous two? How much would his history before the previous two outweigh those two like what what would you think about Hanley and then there's also the fact that even when he's doing this incredible stuff he's been banged up yeah that's the is yeah that's the that would be the main concern for me is that he's had he's had serious injuries he's had nagging injuries repeatedly

even even this year as you say he's he's missed half the year with various ailments. So that would scare me. And he is, you know, he's about to turn 30, I guess. He'll turn 30 this December. And, you know, is probably at best just, you know, a passable shortstop. I mean, I think the fact that he's playing shortstop as he's about to turn 30, he's already exceeded what most people projected for him. I think most people probably thought that he would have had to move by now or wouldn't be able to play that position now. to move by now or wouldn't be able to play that position now.

And he's, he's played a little third and he played mostly third last year, but, but he is, you know, he's capable of playing shortstop still, but maybe not for, not for too much longer,

probably. I mean, he's, he's never rated well defensively at shortstop and, and you figure strangely this year, this year, he year he has yeah so uh i don't i don't know what that means unless it's it's part of unless it's the single season defensive stat that we shouldn't read into or maybe it's part of happy hanley he's good at shortstop now too um so i don't know I wouldn't be

confident in committing to him for more than a few years he was he seemed like through age 25 he seemed just like a no doubt hall of famer at that point last year you would have thought almost no chance

hall of famer you want to throw an odds on there? So he's at 35 wins is what we have him at. I don't know. I don't think you can go from – I don't know. I don't think you can get like almost nothing out of your age 27 and 28 seasons. And he did start sort of young and was productive young, but then a lot of Hall of Famers are. But that's tough to make up what should be two of your most productive seasons, getting very little out of those.

Well, his total right now is fine. If you're worried about him having sort of missed the chance to accumulate during those two years, it's not that significant. I mean, 35 through age 29 is sort of right around that middle mark where you're real close to a bunch of Hall of Famers and you're real close to a bunch of guys who just barely missed it, guys like Will Clark or John Ulrich or whatever, Pete Rose. And so I would say that just based on how many War P's produced right now,

he's probably something like a coin flip. So the real question is what is he going forward? Is he a Hall of famer going forward or not uh i would i would bet against him okay that's all i need to hear yeah i just like to hear you be negative yeah that was really really scathing i really yeah yeah i hope this doesn't get around to him i don't know you just made some enemies, my friend. Yeah, he's going to put this podcast up on the wall in the clubhouse and look at it for motivation before his at-bats. So the second thing is that Jeff Sullivan wrote a piece yesterday imagining what the Marlins would be like right now if they hadn't sold off everything.

And it is, I hadn't really thought about this, but in retrospect, you know, they traded Hanley and he was way better than they would have expected. He's been a superstar this year. And they traded Anibal Sanchez and the piece kind of, by the way, presupposes that they would have re-signed him. But Sanchez also kind of turns into a superstar in aupposes that they would have re-signed him. But Sanchez also kind of turns into a superstar in a way that you didn't really expect. And then, of course, Jose Fernandez is a superstar in a way that at the time they weren't expecting. And so

Jeff wonders whether, or maybe he doesn't want to do this, but maybe I'm wondering whether they made the right move, whether in fact they had enough to compete. And so just briefly, he looks at the team war with an imaginary Marlins team. And the results are that they would have been just about in the middle of the pack, I think like maybe one or two spots above the median, one spot behind the Angels, one spot ahead of the Indians, which makes you think probably like low 80s wins. But, of course, close enough that a couple things could have broken, right? Although maybe Hanley and Sanchez and Fernandez all being awesome are those things breaking, right?

And, you know, 10 teams make the playoffs. So if you're over 500, you've got a pretty good chance usually. So I don't know. I just this surprised me a little bit because it makes you realize how many good players you need to actually be a winning team. That I mean, you you it seems like, oh, well, if you add Cy Young candidate Anibal Sanchez, MVP candidate Hanley Ramirez, plus Jose Reyes is having a good year, plus John Buck, and plus Mark Burley, and all these guys, you still are just kind of a 500 team. It takes a ton. And so, I don't know, maybe something to keep in mind if a lousy team goes and tries to go from 70 wins to 90 next year, next offseason.

Yeah, that's a big jump. Okay, so I just have a couple of questions, I guess. If you, I don't know, taking the teams that are in the playoffs as of today, or if you want to lump in one of the teams that's, you know, a game or half game today or if you want to lump in one of the teams that's you know a game or half game out or whatever you can um which one would you say is the cardinals the best bet to be back next year cardinals uh yeah yeah i think i think the cardinals i how much how much of that is the front office factor and how much is who is currently on the roster? None of it is the front office factor probably.

I mean for next year particularly, none of it is. And I don't really have a way of distinguishing front offices. If you – I don't know. There's probably like 18 front offices that I think of as plus and like 11 that I think of as pretty good and like one that I think of as plus and 11 that I think of as pretty good and one that I think sucks and the one that sucks is going to make the playoffs. So I don't really know anything. But I don't know.

It's just a combination of their – well, it's a little bit of a combination of everything. I think that they are maybe – I think I probably think that they're the best team right now today. Um, and they have, uh, they're not, they have a, they have a, uh, a good payroll situation. They don't have many parts to deal with this off season. They have a very balanced roster. They have a deep roster. Um, they have a not old roster and then they have that farm system, which is an incredible farm system. So that's why. There's nothing to me that says that the Cardinals are going to change their state of awesomeness for at least four or five years. I would bet, I would say the Cardinals are the World Series favorite for at least the next five years. Okay. So you mean having to win the team that's most likely to win one in the next five years?

Or every single year from now until... Right. Well, no, if I had the opportunity to bet on the Cardinals against any team of your choosing for each of the next five years, I would take the Cardinals. Okay. So which is the team that is most likely not to make it back then? Because there's not, there isn't really a team that I look at that looks like its window is about to close. And this is like the last hurrah and everyone's old and they're a bunch of free agents and there's no no one on the way from the farm and like this is it like you know you looked at I don't know maybe like the Phillies a couple years ago or some team like that that had been

good for a while but you know the core was aging and declining and there wasn't really anything on the way to replace it. Is there a team that fits that profile right now where you say that they have to win now or they won't be back? I don't think they have to win now or they won't be back, but I would say that the team that I'd be short selling is the Tigers. And, you know, they have some kind of structural advantages. they are a wealthy team with a weak division and so you you're always gonna be hesitant to say well they can't win next year and they probably I don't know they probably will win next year but to me the Tigers look like a team that is really great but also potentially very flimsy yeah you know Fielder doesn't seem to be aging well necessarily,

or he might not age well. Miguel Cabrera is arguably, you don't know what the hip's going to do. Maybe he has to have hip surgery tomorrow. Maybe Justin Verlander is in the middle of a collapse, and you just don't know it quite yet. Sanchez and Fister both seem like guys who are really great and I'd love to have them but pitchers being pitchers and their track record of aceness being fairly short, both of those guys could be 5.3 ERA next year and it wouldn't shock me.

It's an old team and they don't have much farm system and I'm not a huge fan of Castellanos. Yeah, there's definitely potential for things to get ugly there, I think. And they've got a ton of money kind of locked up too. Yeah, I feel like it's probably not next year though. I would be worried about two years from now, three years from now. Next year, I'd still be pretty confident in them. Yeah, I mean, I'll probably pick them for next year. But, you know, the Indians and the Royals are both going to probably push the,

or at least are going to attempt to push how many wins it takes to win that division up. And, you know, they're a young team. But I agree. I think the Tigers are probably the favorite next year. I think that they're – they were like – in my head, though, they were like a 90% favorite coming into this year, and they're like maybe a 45% favorite next year. I don't know if it's a given that the Royals will improve.

I could see it going either way, but I could see them just treading water next year, even being worse, because the pitching has been so good, even parts of the pitching staff that no one really expected to be this good, that I feel like that's going to regress a bit, probably. Like, you know, either they'll lose Santana or Santana won't be as good or, you know, they won't have quite as lucky a season out of Guthrie. And they've had like the best bullpen of the past, you know, whatever it is, 30 years or something. and clearly they have a bottomless well of productive relievers, but you would always bet on the bullpen that's been incredible to be less incredible next year. So I feel like they're going to take a step back there,

and you could certainly see some of their young hitters taking a step forward, which is kind of what we've been saying for the last couple of years. But that would just sort of make up for their losses. So I don't know. It doesn't look to me like they will necessarily push Detroit next year. But maybe. Yeah, reasonable. And then the other guys, I guess, like, I guess I'm still, is any part of you still skeptical about the A's?

I'm not skeptical about the pitching really, but I still look at all the platooning and all the no-name guys who are having good years, and maybe this is the best Donaldson will ever be and Coco Crisp will be older and all these guys that they're getting great production out of or at least adequate production out of and there are really no holes anywhere on the on the team or in the lineup none of them seems like the greatest bets to to be productive a few years from now uh so i could i could see that maybe not being a lasting thing but then again maybe they can just continue to

you know whether it's the scouting or whatever it is that that has enabled them to make such smart moves and acquisitions uh maybe they can just keep doing that. I don't know if you can keep doing that indefinitely. I don't know if it's sustainable to draft really poorly and just make great minor league signings and trades. I guess the drafting could even out where they could start getting some draft picks as their ability to find these free talent guys dries up. Yeah, in my core, sure.

But at a certain point, you just have to stop saying wrong things. I mean, they're the winningest AL team over a two-year period. So that's more information than we have, you and I. It really is. The fact that they just constantly win. It also feels notable that they've done this without really investing any... I can't think of one thing they've done that was to serve today at the expense of tomorrow, you know, unless it's trading Grant Green, they basically have managed to do this without sacrificing anything from their future. So presumably they are in a good position for next year, just from a resource perspective.

And I guess you could look at, well, you can look at the Pittsburgh pickups who have turned out so well at some point in the next year or two, just because they've drafted so poorly, it seems like, in the last several years. They have this reputation as being a good drafting team from all the high picks that they had and the good picks that they had in 2006 and 2007. But as a bunch of people have pointed out, Tim Beckham is the first know, like the first player they've drafted since 2007 to make the majors. And he's Tim Beckham. And so, you know, they would have to do the same thing that the A's have done. And we talked about how atypical it is for a small market team to succeed like that without drafting its own young talent.

I guess they still have enough guys in their pre-arb years or in their arb years where you could see it lasting for a while. Like, Longoria will be cheap forever, and they have Jennings, and Myers will be cheap for several years, and... Moore will be cheap forever and they have jennings and myers will be cheap for several years and uh more will be cheap forever yeah um yeah and cob and archer um and you know i guess price is the the obvious candidate to be traded for whatever the next wave of of new talent is uh but it will be I guess, for them to keep it going, um, without having a bunch of, you know, number one picks supplementing, uh, supplementing holes on the roster. So then last question is what is the team that is not in the playoffs this year

that you think is most likely to be next year? Probably the Nationals. Yeah, that seems like the obvious and not fun answer because I'm really going for a team that we haven't seen win recently. I would agree that the Nationals are the clear answer to that. I don't know. I guess the Cubs would be the closest thing to that. I don't know. I guess the Cubs would be the closest thing to your answer. Yeah. Like if you're asking for who next year's Orioles or Pirates are going to be.

Yeah, and I hate that question. Well, there's only like three teams that still qualify as being a Royal or a Pirate. Like everybody except the Royals has made the playoffs basically now at least once. So you have the Rockies would fit. The Marlins would fit. The maybe Twins might fit. The Mariners would fit. The Padres might fit.

So yeah, those are your teams to choose from. I don't really particularly want to choose any of them. I like the Cubs next year. Yeah, okay. I can go along with that. All right. Are we finished? Yep.

Okay. I wanted to read a quote that I just read. This is from Dale Swaim. Dale Swaim said, Kevin Gregg has been one of the better closers in all of baseball. God knows where we'd be without him. Never would have seen that quote coming six months ago.

Not really. Not sure I would have seen that quote coming yesterday. Four minutes ago, yeah. Okay, so that's it for this week. Send us emails for next week's email show at podcast at baseballperspectives.com. And so many of you send us emails in response to things that we say on the podcast that I wish that everyone who's listening could read because they kind of fill in blanks that we leave. Like if we, if we wonder whether something ever happened,

we will almost inevitably get three emails about it the next day with people pointing out that it happened. Like when we talked this past week about whether a player could get ejected mid play, we got several emails about that. A couple of people pointed out that Justin Upton was ejected as he was running to first base a couple weeks ago after he and an umpire had not gotten along during the at-bat.

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Perspectives, which is our website. Shaking my head at you encouraging everyone to be part of your system. Okay. So have a nice weekend. I will be locked in my bunker playing Grand Theft Auto until the next time we talk, if you need me. Uh, and I hope you all have a wonderful weekend, and we will be back on Monday.