Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 364: The All-Hypothetical Podcast

Episode Date: January 14, 2014

Ben and Sam discuss hypothetical questions about Mike Trout, Barry Bonds, Mark Mulder and more.

🎵 I'll be real soon. I predict. Are my sources correct? I predict. Good morning and welcome to episode 364 of Effectively Wild, the daily podcast from baseballprospectus.com. I'm Sam Miller with Ben Lindberg. How are you, Ben? Sleepy. Just awoken from a nap.

Hey, I was going to say happy birthday to my dad, but by the time we publish this, it won't be his birthday. Yeah, you should probably just call him. So do you want to talk about baseball? Yeah, sure. All right. This is actually going to be an all predictions episode. Oh, boy.

Going back to bed. I know you like to predict things and these are all these are all conditional predictions so you know like like like if the dodgers signed to naka how many games would they win like that would be a conditional prediction right so none of these predictions will be relevant unless the conditions happen so it's i mean it's conceivable that you'll be safe i hope so so i'm just gonna start shooting them at you and i want to hear your your predictions for these okay okay all right if barry bonds signs with the rangers to be their dh what will he hit? Barry Bonds turning 50 next season, this season. Barry Bonds would hit, well, Barry Bonds is much smaller than he was

the last time we saw him in a uniform. Bonds is much smaller than he was the last time we saw him in a uniform. I would guess he'd hit about 200. Okay.

You're just sticking with batting average on that one. You know Ben Lindbergh. That's a start. That's a start. It's going to take me like 10 more minutes to do the rest of the the triple slash uh 200 270 3 uh 40 all right so let me ask you this if if he started on opening day like let's say on a scale of one to ten um they used to walk him a 10 on a scale of one to ten right they walked him more than than anybody could possibly be walked and like uh you know a pitcher is maybe walked on on like like a one on a scale of one to

ten and you know in the middle you have like the average major leaguer who's more or less thrown strikes, but you don't pour him in. So that would be a five. On the first day of the season, how would they treat him? Probably like a two. Really? You think they'd just go right at him? Yeah. I don't think anyone would be afraid of a 50-year-old or almost 50-year-old Barry Bunz who weighs whatever he weighs now. He's been bicycling, though. He has.

I don't know how that helps, really, but yeah. I'm going to say, I'll say 185, 285, 410. A lot of power there still. Yeah, that is a lot of power. I mean, we're talking about Texas too. We've moved him from San Francisco to Texas, which hurts the walks, but that's power. Yeah, I don't know.

That's still a lot of walks. It is a lot of walks. I mean, it's still a lot of walks. It is a lot of walks. I mean, it's still a lot of walks. It's half as many walks as he was getting at the end. At the end being 42. So is that like an above average walk rate still? Oh, yeah, certainly. Yeah, I don't see that.

I don't think a 185 average 410 slug in a good hitter's ballpark ends up with a lot of blocks. I feel like you haven't spent as much time staring at Ricky Henderson's player page as I have. Because Ricky Henderson at the end, when he was 44, was still well above average. My favorite, I mean, there are probably two or three lines that you could pick to be the best Ricky Henderson line in his late career. My favorite one probably is in Anaheim when he was 38, which he hit 183 with a 343 on base percentage

and a 261 slugging percentage. But actually, no, I'm sorry, the best one is definitely in york when he was with the mets and he was 41 and he hit 219 and he slugged 229 and he had and he had a 387 on base percentage so i don't feel like you're giving enough credit to a man with a plan. I don't know. Ricky had a smaller strike zone. He was shorter and kind of crouched over. And I think even 44 having played continuously is a lot different from 49 having not played for six seasons.

I don't know, but his isolated power was 10. Yeah. Pons would have a higher isolated power than that. All right. All right, next prediction. What will Mike Trout hit against right-handed pitching if he starts switch hitting right now? What are you looking up?

There's nothing on the internet for this, Ben. I assume he has no switch hitting experience whatsoever. I mean, I'm sure he messed around. I'm sure he messed around and got a triple-double when he was in high school. But there's not a thing where, like, Angels writers know that, like, he does it in batting practice from time to time and he's actually really good? Like, the Ichiro could hit tons of homers if he if he tried thing no uh no there's not that's not a uh that's not part of his lore but um like i i think that to some degree uh well i know that uh a lot of uh some hitters will just will switch

hit in the cages and i forget why um but like i saw mark trumbo once switch hitting in the cages and I forget why um but like I saw Mark Trumbo once switch hitting in the cages and he's not a switch hitter he's never you know he's never done it he was doing it for some sort of drill and uh and he was really good I mean he was not majorly good but he looked competent I mean you got to figure what do you think 80 percent of hitting is identifying pitches yeah sure and he's he's got that and he's got the ability i mean he'd be three probably three four down the line from the left side and so uh you know anything on the ground is close and he's strong and he's got the hands and he probably, I would estimate that right now, left-handed, he's one of the, I don't know, 8,000 best hitters in the world? I don't know.

I think I'd probably, well, I would definitely take the under on my Barry Bonds. Wait, hang on. I found it. This is Baseball America's write-up of him when he was minor league player of the year. And the scout who found him, Morehart, Greg Morehart, I think his name is. Morehart saw Trout dabble with switch hitting. See, this is why I was googling could have found something so he dabbled in switch hitting okay so that that revises my estimate a little bit um all right uh what did i say for Bonds? 200, I think, gosh, I think Mike Trout would hit 180.

270, 350. That's a lot of power. I would say $2.35, $2.60, $2.60. I'm saying no power. Huh. Okay. It's hard to know. I mean, by the end of the year, he might be slashing doubles down the line,

but I just don't see any power in that swing. Uh-huh. Okay. Well, this will be settled never. Uh-huh. All right. If Alex Rodriguez goes to Japan this year, what are the chances he will break the all-time home run record there?

I would give him like a, what is it, 60? That was just set this year um yeah uh man i wonder if a rod at age 39 would be the best uh mlb export to japan ever. Because it usually is people like Valentin who've kind of, you know, marginal players who have topped out at AAA or something or washed out in the majors and in some small amount of playing time. I would guess that he would have something like a 20% shot, and probably that low because, in part, he would just break down at some point. That's a really good shot you're giving him.

Yeah, that is a good shot. Probably too good because he would probably get hurt. True talent-wise, I would say that. But, yeah, what are you going to say um do you know if they test in Japan they don't I don't either I also don't know what Manny's stats were in Taiwan do you do you remember how Manny did in Taiwan I vaguely recall him crushing like I recall a lot of home run trots yeah right yeah I remember a lot of he was 41 yeah he was 41 he hit 352 with eight homers and 43 rbis but in 49 games so not a lot of power surprising and yeah and

taiwan's a much lower talent level than japan um so yeah that was yeah probably too high too high a probability I'll say I'll say that the median number of home runs he would hit would be 48 and so I'd give him yeah probably a 1 in 5 1 in 6 chance seems right to me hmm okay

alright this one's pretty unrealistic but if Mark Mulder if Mark Mulder comes out of retirement and signs with the Angels what will he do? And we're going to give I'm going to give you a little bit of ground rules here

We're going to assume that he gets a full year in the rotation as long as he's healthy that he gets his 32 starts unless he's hurt okay um i guess uh i guess like a 5.5 era really yeah Yeah. I'm much more optimistic than that. I kind of, I don't know. I feel like, I mean, the human brain is. What has Mark Mulder been up to?

I didn't read that story about why he decided to come back. Well, he's been, I mean, he's been on ESPN doing commentary. But he hadn't thrown for like a year. The last time he had thrown, he had nothing. He could barely throw 100 feet. And he saw Paco Rodriguez pitching. Yeah. And he found the mechanics to be like odd and interesting.

And so he just sort of got up in his living room and like started mimicking it. And it felt good. And so then he got like I want to say Kyle Loesch or somebody he knew to throw with him and he was like new. I think he's like in the low 90s right now. Really? Yeah. Hmm.

Yeah, low 90s. Okay. And scouts say that the change up is now his best pitch that it's like a dynamite change-up all of a sudden and he's got he's got funk you know he's got funk because he's got the paco rodriguez motion okay he hasn't thrown in six years that's a that's a plus right maybe uh if he's stayed in shape And I guess he has But well I don't know I don't know whether that's a plus or not

Maybe your endurance breaks down To the point that you're more likely to get hurt Even though you got all that rest So let's say that Major League Baseball Didn't let you do roster moves And you were stuck with your opening day Lineup And you're a team and you have On the your opening day lineup and you're a team

and you have on the last day of spring training, you have to decide between Mark Mulder, Tommy Hanson, Joe Blanton and Jerome Williams, which is not with the Angel situation, but let's say that that was your situation. Those four guys and you've got to pick one. Where does Mulder rank among the four? Well, if that scouting assessment of him is accurate and he's stayed healthy, I mean, I don't want any of those other guys. So I guess I'd roll the dice with him. I don't know. I'm basically saying that he will be as good at age 36 as he was as a 22 year old rookie in oakland i i don't know

uh right i mean yeah i don't know i i haven't i haven't seen him i haven't seen him pitch, but I would not expect great things. I expect great things. I mean, relatively, everybody who makes the majors is pretty great. I would guess that he would be... I would happily bet on a 90 or higher ERA+. At least, let me rephrase that. I would bet on that for the first half. I don't know that I'm betting on him in the second half. Odds that he has a better comeback season than Scott Casimir?

Well, the thing is, I think I'm probably being swayed too much by Scott Casimir. And Scott Casimir is not the norm, although, I mean, you know, Ryan Vogelsang was just as unlikely, and Bartolo Colon was completely gone. And there seems to be, I don't know, something in players' DNA that once they get physically healthy

again, they're able to come back without really missing a beat. And, you know, pitching is something where some of the skills actually age really well. Some of the pitchability aspects of it, you know, age nicely. So, what was the question? The odds that he will have a better comeback season than Scott Kazmir. You know, Kazmir's FIP was better than his ERA. But if we're just talking about ERA, I would say 34%. Okay. Pretty big believer.

I am kind of a pretty big believer i want to believe okay all right if the dodgers send clayton kershaw to their low a team in um um uh where great lakes is it i think they're in Great Lakes. In the Midwest League. And they make him their closer. What will his stats be in 70 innings? Okay, 70 innings he will strike out He will strike out 16 per mine. Oh, that's interesting.

So that's like 120. Yeah, sure. And he'll have it. 112, it's 112. And he'll have a.75 ERA. So.75 ERA is like six runs. Okay. I say that he will strike out 165 batters in seven innings uh so that's like 23 per nine no it's

like 21 per nine and he will allow one run how many will he walk? Four. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I guess that's plausible. If you had said starter in A-ball, I would say that's impossible. But he is not only going to A-ball, he is also going to the bullpen. Yeah. And he's going to be working one inning at a time um so yeah i think if there's if there's any in any downside to having major league baseball it's that there's really only one place for the best players to play like you don't really see the you never get to see really the best player in the world playing in an artificially low environment. The best you can hope for is something like Tanaka.

And, you know, Tanaka is nobody's idea of the best pitcher in the world. But, you know, he's too good for Japan, and he had like a 1.1 ERA or something like that and went 25-0. But, yeah, it would be more fun for us all if every once in a while you had some weird situation where a player was compelled like if like like i don't know it'd be fun if like i don't know if kershaw like enlisted in the marines or something and was playing on like the the marines baseball team and we could just watch him play against, like, 19-year-olds who didn't get drafted.

That would be fun to me. Well, I wrote that article about how major leaguers do when they're on rehab assignments, and it wasn't anything crazy, really, but they're also rehabbing from an injury, so that's not quite the same. Did we ever talk about when Goldstein wrote about what Manny Ramirez would do in high A? We definitely had, maybe on some listener email show, we had the conversation of, I don't know, what Miguel Cabrera would hit in some minor league level. We did something like that, but I don't know.

I don't know if we did it for Manny specifically. Yeah, you just yawned. Yep. Uh-huh. On the show. I'm not the only one. All right. Oh.

Okay. All right. Last one. Johnny Damon and Bobby Abreu, both making notions toward comebacks. Making motions, I guess. Yeah. Having notions. Do you have have I guess

Abreu has to be your preference in this situation right? yeah yeah I think so not that is either one of them replacement level at this point? I'd say

I could see replacement level I mean Abreu Abreu in 2012 was kind of close to a league average hitter. He was a league average hitter. He was above average in 2011, a little bit below in 2012. I could see him walking enough to be replacement level Maybe if he were a DH I wouldn't want him in the outfield Yeah, he in his final year He walked even more than I predicted Bonds would too

And he was terrible Yeah, well He was over 10 years younger than Bonds would be in your scenario. Yeah, but Bonds is, I mean, I feel like you're thinking that Barry Bonds is just a good player. Like, do you remember when Barry Bonds was playing? Sure. But I remember how afraid of him everyone was also. That was part of it yeah i mean in his last season he i mean in his last season he had a 480 on base percentage

he was he was 42 he you know he was a good hitter still but he had a 480 on base percentage like it's only been eight years, seven years. How much do you shed per year? I would think a lot. We don't really have an aging curve for those years because no one plays in them. If it was 20 points of on base percentage a year, he'd still be at 340. 30 points and he'd still be at 270, which 30 points a year is a lot. Yeah, I don't know if it would be linear, though, because once you can't hit anymore.

Yeah, the fewer walks. And then the fewer walks, probably the worse he is anyway. So, yeah, I don't know. I don't think that you respected this exercise enough. I think we just we just took everyone's listener email questions for this week this was this was basically we should have pretended that these were emails that we received okay go ahead go go ahead and edit it okay uh well slow news day that's the end of the show we'll be back tomorrow with another show