Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 57: The Teams That Will Win a World Series in the Next Five Years/Are Beat Writers Becoming More or Less Important?/The O’s Start Saunders

Episode Date: October 5, 2012

Ben and Sam are joined by Marc Normandin, formerly of Baseball Prospectus and currently of SB Nation, to discuss which teams will win a World Series in the next five years, the changing role of beat writers, and Joe Saunders, the Orioles’ starter in tonight’s play-in game.

Good morning and welcome to episode 57 of Effectively Wild. Ben, what if they're not listening in the morning? This is a source of tension actually, almost every day off air. Ben, seriously, what if they're not listening in the morning? Well, Sam says good morning and good evening. Because we literally post it at night. We post it in the morning, technically, in Eastern time zone. I don't approve.

We've never covered good afternoon. Just say it right now, just in case. All right, so good whatever time of day it is when you're listening to this. Wow, that's really... I am Ben Lindberg in New York, New York, in Long Beach, California. He is Sam Miller, and also in New York, New York, for one night only, is guest host, I suppose, Mark Normandin. I don't want to be a host. That's too much pressure. Okay, well, guest then. Both a guest and a house guest, which is why you are on the podcast.

Under no circumstances would we invite you on otherwise. Dude, I was eating popcorn in the other room, and you made me do this. Yes, Mark is, instead of singing for his supper, he is, I guess, podcasting for his popcorn, uh, and is staying with me. And so he is on the podcast. So for the second straight day, we have had three people on the podcast, which we had never done before. Uh, and do you want to say something about why you are in New York today? What brings you to New York today? Or what brought you to New York today?

I was here to speak at a Varsity Letters event for the Hall of Nearly Great with both of the people hosting this podcast contributing chapters to And what is the Hall of Nearly Great? You know what it is. It's your project. It's a book that celebrates those who are not celebrated. That's our tagline.

I didn't copyright that at any point, but I probably should. It's a book mostly to celebrate the kind of guys who didn't make the Hall of Fame. Not necessarily that they should have have but there are more interesting players than just the 250 some odd guys here in the hall of fame and that's what this kind of book focuses on and uh we decided to talk about it and you know it's exciting to be able to talk about uh some of these guys ray

langford keith hernandez etc who don't really get the recognition that they probably deserve because they have their own stories to tell. And there are two good chapters by you in it, there's one good chapter by Sam Miller in it, and there's one mediocre chapter by me. Oh, yours is good. Don't do that. To do that sort of fishing in public is particularly shameless. Yeah.

Ben's like, guys, I know I'm awesome, but this is really kind of crappy. Just, oh. This particular thing is crappy. This is like, that's the equivalent of proposing marriage on the big screen, where you've really given us no choice but to stand up and celebrate you. No, Ben. No, it's okay. Don't jump in. It's stand up and celebrate you. No, Ben. No, it's okay. Don't jump in.

It's great. It is a great book, though. I would recommend it to anybody who has, what is it? What do you charge, $10? It's for 400 pages worth of stuff. And how can the people buy it? They can go to hallofnearlygreat.com, and then they can read Ben's underrated essay.

Essay that was nearly great, I would say. Yeah, it was a nearly great essay. It wasn't mediocre. It was just nearly great. But if you do want to buy it, you should click on the link that is on baseballperspectives.com. On to the topics. And we'll get more money for it, and that's good. Yes, the topics. And we'll get more money for it, and that's good. Yes, the topics. What's yours? The next five years of World Series champions.

Okay. Wow. I want to, I guess, say something or really ask something about the role of beat writers and Mark. I'm supposed to have a topic? We discussed this. Yeah, I know, but what was it? I had one. It's Mark's Joe Saunders.

Was it Joe Saunders? Yes, it was Joe Saunders. Thank you, Sam. Mark is drinking. You're welcome. No, I just forget because I have mild ADD probably. Sorry, go ahead. Oy.

Okay, so do you want to go first? Who are you speaking to? Go ahead. Oy. Okay. So do you want to go first? Who are you speaking to? You. Sure. Mine is simple. It's dumb. It requires no preparation.

And all it is is I'm going to go down the list of major league teams, and I'm going to ask each of you whether they will win a World Series in the next five years. So not counting this year. So we're starting in 2013. And basically the point of it is just a state of the organization for every team. Do you believe this is a team that is set up to win sometime in the next five years? And, you know, consolidating everything we've learned about both their major league and minor league systems. So that's it. So count as you go.

I don't want anybody picking six teams for five years. That would be absurd and take away from the integrity of this project. Are you guys ready to go? We're saying we think they will or we think they're capable of it? You think they will. You're picking – yeah. Will. Okay. It has to be will. All let's go all right you ready yeah angels no yes okay a's yes Blue Jays. No. Braves. Nope. Brewers. Nope. I should say I said yes for Angels and I said yes for Braves. Sorry. Cardinals. No. Cubs. Nope. Diamondbacks. Nope. Dodgers. Yes. No. Giants. diamondbacks no dodgers yes no uh giants yes peer pressure yes indians no mariners no no marlins Nationals. Yes. No. I say yes. Orioles.

No. No. Padres. Yeah. That's a loaded question. I'm going to be a super homer right now. Yeah. Let's do that.

No. I say yes. Phillies. No. No. Because I hate them. Pirates. No.

Sorry. Rangers. Yes. Yeah. Rays. No. Reds. No. Yeah. Rays? No. Reds? No.

Sorry, Sensei. Nah. Red Sox? Yeah. No. And they'll surprise everybody, and then they'll forget that they hate them. Rockies? No.

Tigers? Yes. No. I don Yes. No. I don't know. I think you guys have actually both done five, so I don't know why I'm still going, and I don't know why you're still putting so much thought into it. I think it was four. Mark, I have you saying yes for A's, Giants, Padres, Rangers, and Red Sox.

Okay, then forget it. I did have five. And Ben, I have for Angels, Dodgers, Giants, Nationals, Rangers. I shouldn't have given into peer pressure on the Giants. You can undo it. We've got like seven teams still to go. I mean, I was just going to say yes for the Yankees just because they're the Yankees. And that was the only other yes I was going to say. All right.

So we have a – let's see. I was going to say. All right. So we have a let's see. We have two votes for the Angels, one for the A's, one for the Braves, one for the Dodgers, one for the Giants, two for the Nationals, two for the Padres, three for the Rangers, one for the Red Sox and one for the Yankees. So that's who we think. We think that the Rangers are the state of the art Major League Baseball team right now, and we are big fans of the Nationals, Padres, and Angels. I know why Mark likes the Padres. Why do you like the Padres? I don't know. I mean, well, I think that I can't name a bad move that they've made in the last, like, three years, and at a certain point, I think that that all kind of gets consolidated into a pretty good team. I mean, obviously they have some fundamental disadvantages. And if I thought that payroll was ultimate destiny, I probably wouldn't pick them.

But I think that by 2015 and 2016, the Dodgers could be in a pretty ugly state, and the Padres could be peaking. Well, since Ben seems to think that I just totally homered picking the Padres, I'll explain my pick. They probably have the most depth of any single team. That's the other thing. They have the best depth of any single that's yeah that's the other thing they have the best system in baseball it's not even counting the guys they've already promoted who are going to be second year players next year or third year players and you know two years uh they also money's not as big of a thing for them soon because the amount of money they pay for their team now they're just going to get handed to them in a check because of the new contracts

with fox tbs and espn i mean they have a 60 million dollar payroll and 50 million of that for their team now. They're just going to get handed to them in a check because of the new contracts with Fox, TBS, and ESPN. I mean, they have a $60 million payroll, and $50 million of that is just going to be fronted to them by national television contracts, never mind the regional television contract that they have. So money's not really a thing for them soon. That's why they re-signed Houston Street and re-signed Congress Quentin. I mean, they're a team that if those prospects break right

and they don't even all have to break right, that's going to be a dangerous club. You really think the A's, Mark? Yeah. They just have so much pitching, so much pitching, that I feel like they're going to be in it. And they're the kind of team like the Giants where even if they don't have the best offense,

you know, give them five years and they might sneak it in in this football card format, you know. Yeah, but don't you think that, I mean, don't you feel like this year was sort of the anomaly and that over the next probably three years, at least one of the Angels or Rangers is going to win 94, 95, 96 games and make it, you know, extremely difficult for the A's to have any better than the coin flip game? Sure, totally.

But I don't think they have any worse chances than the other teams that you mentioned. I would put more faith in the A's than probably the Angels. Well, you did put more faith in the A's than probably the Angels. I feel like the Angels already blew one of their best chances over the next five years. Because that's a team where there's a bunch of people leaving in free agency and guys are going to get older. And in the case of the Angels, that's a negative.

In the case of the A's, it's probably a positive. Yeah, that makes sense. Hmm. Well. It's not like anyone's going to take a wild card out of there why did we not take the reds whom we have a history of not talking about to avoid talking about them uh no i don't know why we didn't pick the reds i um that's a good question cardinals used to bore me where like they have a lot of really solid players and I feel like it might not be enough I mean they have a lot of good young players and they're in a division where we

immediately ruled out some of the other teams it's going to be harder from here on out though because the Astros are gone no more punching bag yes well no more punching bag but also I mean one one sixth fewer teams. I mean, the Astros obviously weren't a threat for the division over the last two or three years, certainly, but they – that's a reasonable market. I mean, the Astros – the Astros not being in their division over the next five years helps their odds. It doesn't hurt their odds. I like how it makes the AL West crappier. Only in the immediate future.

It's like this division is the best in baseball now. Oh, wait, never mind. This average has been dropped. I guess, yeah. I don't know. When they announced the Astros were moving, that was sort of what everybody was saying about, you know, lol, AL West, but I don't know.

I mean, the Astros are not going to be down forever this is a uh short-term thing i think it's five year thing we're talking about because i mean even if let's say every one of their top prospects pans out they're still mediocre uh well they have they they also get to do other things like they get to have money and stuff like that. Hmm. Okay. So that's why we don't like the Reds.

Because of the Astros? Yeah. The Reds were, I guess, they would be right outside my top five or six. I feel like they've got a lot of NLCS losses in front of them for some reason. I just, when you ask me spur of the moment, like. Okay, next thing. My thing is not going to be long, so I'll go next. Because Mark's actually has something to do with the games that will be played today.

Yes. something to do with the games that will be played today. Yes. So mine was just inspired by a Q&A that Will Leach did with Derek Gould, one of the Cardinals beat writers. And he basically, well, he asked him many things, but he asked him specifically whether he thinks beat writers are more important today than they used to be, or have become more or less irreplaceable. And as the only former beat writer who is on this podcast right now, I wonder what your thoughts are. Derek Gould's thoughts fact that the beat writer is the only person who is there on the scene and at the source and is kind of the immediate conduit of all the news that then gets filtered out into all those other media. So do you agree

with that from your own experience? I think if you divide it into the beat writers who are working for newspapers and the beat writers who are working for Major League Baseball advanced media covering the teams for their official pages, I think that that's a crucial distinction. I think that the newspaper beat writer is less important than ever. distinction. I think that the newspaper beat writer is less important than ever. And the reason is that so, so much of what a beat writer tells you is essentially just handed to you in a press release or announced over the loudspeaker in the press box. And that information has virtually no actual value, you know, in the sense that it's not one. Nobody is unearthing that information. It's it's they're sort of distributing it to you.

But if teams could figure out a way to distribute it directly to you, then the beat writer would be superfluous. superfluous. And they have. They have figured out a way to distribute it directly to you, essentially, which is by having their own reporters writing on their own websites. And I think that there's certainly a potential that over a period of years, the cost of travel will discourage even more newspapers from writing about the teams, which has already happened to a large extent. And teams will increasingly restrict access to the players, to the clubhouse, to the press box, if they feel like it, because they don't really need to be writers. They can pretty much talk directly to the players, rather to the fans. This was a phenomenon I saw when I was covering education. When I realized that the most trusted source for education news was no longer the newspaper, it was the principal's

newsletter. And the principal was able to essentially break news and control the beat in a lot of ways by writing a specific and detailed newsletter that answered all the questions. And the principal was able to essentially break news and control the beat in a lot of ways by writing a specific and detailed newsletter that answered all the questions. And so if you're getting the information directly from the principal, then you don't really need it from the reporter. There's some danger to democracy when that sort of a thing happens. I don't think that baseball reporting really reflects a crucial corner of democracy, though. And so it would not actually trouble me as much as maybe it should trouble me to see that happen. But I don't know.

I mean, we've all had the experience when we're looking at our Twitter feed and instantaneously eight different reporters tell you at the exact same time that Dustin Pedroia left the game because of a sore Achilles. And it is not as though they all have awesome sources and they were working the phones and they discovered this excellent news about Dustin Pedroia's medical exams. It was just read to them. And then they all race to be a quarter second ahead of each other on Twitter. And when you think about what that process is, you can really see how valueless it is to the consumer. Well, you know, I agree with some of what you're saying in the sense that, yeah, everyone is going to post the lineups all at the same time. And all of a sudden, Mark's Twitter

feed has 12 different tweets about the Red Sox lineup in it. But there are a lot of guys who do the beat. I think in this generation, you're talking younger guys. They're exceptional analysts, too. They're not exactly what the previous generation was. They're a different breed. They're made for now and they're made for the past. So they can do all the stuff that we might think has less value now because

multiple people do it, but they can also do the kind of stuff that the three of us do. I mean, just talking Boston, Brian McPherson and Tim Britton from the Providence Journal are both fantastic. They're great analysts. They're excellent. They know what they're talking about, and they don't even need to go around asking people to know what they're talking about. Like, they just outright know. They grew up with it. Alex Spear, who works for EI and has worked in the Red Sox beat

for a long time, is one of the best in the entire business. There are guys like that for other teams, too. It's not just, like, a Boston thing. I mean, I wish it was because then I could brag about it, but there are others, and i feel like they've adapted they've they're able to do your typical beat writer thing but they're also able to be all of the stuff that bloggers want to be but with access yeah i guess i don't dispute any of that. And I think that I would agree that the things that make many beat writers unnecessary these days, those same factors and forces make good beat writers even better. Because beat writers can, if they choose to, if they avail themselves of these things, can use all of the same skills that a very good blogger does.

And, you know, that those there are more tools available to them. So, yes, I would agree with that. There are a lot of days where I go to write something and I realize Brian McPherson has already written it. And I'm just like, damn it. You know, and then it ends up being instead of me writing an article, I go, Brian McPherson wrote this really good thing, and I'm going to link to it and talk about it. But I really wish he hadn't because I wanted to do it. I mean I don't – if beat guys were kind of pointless, then I don't feel like I would ever have that feeling three out of five days a week. is that there's another category that we haven't talked about, which is the non-beat writer who is nonetheless reporting. And that's another thing that I think makes some beat writers a bit unnecessary is that a lot more writers have access now. And it feels to me like a lot more bloggers

and a lot more online writers and a lot more sort of non-traditional writers are taking advantage of that access. And you see, like Jonah Carey, what he's doing at Grantland where he's doing these in-depth interviews with the GM of the Rockies, that sort of a thing. The reporting is still important. It's the trappings of the beat that I think are maybe less important. And also, let's be honest, the best reporter for every team is Ken Rosenthal. I mean, he is more tuned in to every single team than most beat writers on those teams. Someone has to balance out John Rossi. Well, someone has to balance out Sean Rossi. If someone weren't there digging and depending on getting them, if we just left it to the team to divulge those things, they might just not or not as often because they might not have as much incentive to.

So I feel like you have a good point there. Like, just recent topical kind of thing. You know, if you listen to what the Sox said, they're like, oh, we're not thinking about Bobby Valentine until the season's over. And every beat writer for the Sox is like, yeah, they're full of it. Like, there is absolutely no way they haven't thought about this until the season ends. Like, it's not like some magical barrier lifts after game 162. So, you know, everyone was really prepared for him being fired. But if you listen to just the Sox and their line of communication that they had, it was like it was something that had never crossed their mind uh yeah but you knew that anyway i mean what they were doing was the same thing that anybody could have done which is using basic logic to to sort of dissect what the official party yeah i mean i don't think everyone

automatically thinks like that that's the thing because there are a lot of i mean cheap is mean but there are a lot of people who just listen to whatever is told to them and go with that. So if you don't have someone else in the middle kind of going, yeah, no, that's not accurate at all, then – Yeah, the question is just whether the person who's in the middle saying that needs to be spending 500 hours in a press box watching games and doing the whole thing. I mean, it's a fairly inefficient system. Well, at least it was when I did it. I was not very good at it at all. I was horrible, horrible at it, in fact.

But basically you spend 10 hours at the park and you get very, very little. There's a lot of waiting around. There's a lot of being told the things that, you know, the sort of official team releases. And there's watching the game and, you know, being kind of in a little bit of a sort of a coffin, which is how the press box feels sometimes. And, you know, I not convinced that that having the authority um on a team be in the press box is is better than having the authority on the team be somebody like grant brisby who does a spectacular job without ever walking into the park yeah that's not fair because grant would do everyone's job better than anybody yeah it's true it's grant that's not i have to work with that guy.

Do you know how horrible it is for my self-esteem? I have some idea of what that would be like. It's awful. I hate myself more every day. Okay. So I don't know. Let's just agree that it's a complicated issue and we don't really know yet. They're good and not but good.

I like a lot of them. The good ones are good and the bad ones are bad. They're good and not, but good. I like a lot of them. The good ones are good, and the bad ones are bad. That's, I think, the answer. I feel like the bad ones make the good ones just that much greater. The bad ones make the good ones. Yeah. You said it, so don't act like you don't know, Sam, because you said it with different words.

Tell me about Joe Saunders. Joe Saunders is super underrated. Can I just set up the topic? He totally just set up the topic. There is a reason that we're talking about Joe Saunders. Because he's better than everyone thinks? I don't know if that's the reason. It's true.

Buckshaw Walter had to choose between Steve Johnson, who is a favorite of Sam Miller's, and Joe Saunders, who is a favorite of Sam Miller's, and Joe Saunders, who is a favorite of Mark Normandin's, and Mark Normandin's favorite one. It seemed like it was kind of a toss-up because Johnson has pitched well this year but didn't really have much experience in the majors under 40 innings and also had a bit of a lingering knee issue, which may have been a factor. And then Saunders is, well, I guess Mark will tell you that he's better than most people think he is, but he had a very poor track record against the Rangers and specifically in Texas,

which it was something like a nine and a half ERA, almost in six starts. So a lot of people thought that Showalter would look at that history and not want to start him there. But that is not the case. He will be starting tonight's game between the Orioles and the Rangers. And Mark will now tell you why that was such a wise decision. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I mean, I don't particularly love the Joe Saunders and Arlington thing.

But in general, Joe Saunders is pretty underrated. I mean, he's a guy who usually gets like 200 innings a year or more. Pretty much like clockwork. He's done it twice. What? Yeah. 200 innings? Yeah, he had 203 once and he had 212 once.

No, that's wrong. Was he close other times yeah no i mean how close uh he had he had a 198 a 186 he's at 174 this year and he's got a 107 and 120 oh sorry no the 120 was this split so ignore the 120 yeah thank you. Okay. Okay, so Joe Saunders... Sometimes pitches 200 innings. A lot. But maybe not 200 innings all the time. But Saunders is a guy, I mean, he's good in a way that people don't normally recognize. If you look at FIP or FIP, what do we call it on this podcast? FIP.

FIP. I hate that. what do we call it on this podcast? FIP. FIP. I hate that. But if you look at FIP, Saunders doesn't look that great, but FIP doesn't encompass everything that a pitcher can do.

Saunders is a guy who induces way more double plays than expected. And, I mean, that's the kind of thing where, you know, the stat that tracks that isn't it compensates for defense so it's not just that Joe Saunders played with really good second baseman shortstops or anything uh you know he gets more than he should and he does that consistently and I mean he blows away the rest of the majors Saunders is kind of like Mark Burley in a lot of ways uh you know he works fast which is one of those things where there's been research done that maybe that is the kind of positive that doesn't show up in something like fit which is what we're calling it on this podcast i have to reiterate and then stopped and you know he gets a

lot of double plays he's not super ground ball oriented but he gets ground balls when there are guys on base it's like a that like a timely ground ball kind of thing. Yeah, I'm kind of, if I can interrupt, I'm trying to find the stat on Saunders' ground ball double plays because I know it's absolutely absurd. He's like way ahead of everybody. Before 2012, it was something like he had 52 double plays above expected over like 2008 through 2011, which was easily the league lead. Yeah, which is like you say, he is a decent ground baller,

but not really an extreme ground baller. It's like a timing thing, though. It's like he doesn't get ground balls when there's nobody on. He gets ground balls when there's somebody on, like something he changes his approach in the way he pitches, and it's one of those things that advanced stats aren't going to capture. I always wondered, you know, he always seemed like a guy who had more stuff than he

showed. Like, I mean, he, he, he doesn't pitch like a guy with stuff, but he, you know, he, he hits 94 and, uh, he was like 94 bottom corner of the zone and do some ground ball kind of thing. Like it'll happen and he'll do it when he needs to. But you don't think about that. Cause you see a guy striking out six per nine which is below average but you know it's it's a weird kind of situational when the time comes he knows how to pitch there's there's some john garland in them kind of thing where it's another guy who situationally really knows how to pitch but if you just look at the raw stats you're kind of like this guy isn't really as special as people think he is but you put the guy in the right environment you put him in the right setting

and he's going to do well. I don't know if the AL East is the right setting for Joe Saunders. Arlington probably is not the right setting for a guy who gets ground balls, kind of. But in general, Joe Saunders is kind of an underappreciated piece. Well, in one of the first podcasts that ben and i did we talked about the playoff starter a guy who is good enough to start in the playoffs and where that line is and we basically zeroed in on on exactly where the line is between a guy that you wouldn't mind starting

in the playoffs and a guy who you would be making a trade at the trade deadline to replace him. And we found that the line was 102.5 ERA plus, I believe. Maybe it was 103, maybe it was 102. It might have been 102.5. But it's basically, I think it was the line between Gavin Floyd and John Danks. And Joe Saunders, since the Angels traded him to the Diamondbacks, I think of him as being a tremendous failure. And yet his ERA plus in that time is 104. So he passes our test he's kind of i mean he's kind of the guy who's like oh crap we have to have a game four

and you know then he pitches yeah and it's okay because he'll keep you in it and if you can hit you're okay but if joe saunders is your last hope well well, I guess you're the Orioles in 2012. But, you know, we're talking about a team that also has, like, let's name the Orioles rotation right now because we'll probably all get it wrong with at least one guy. Yeah, we talked about this too. We don't actually know what the rotation would be. And when we talked about it, it was in the context of Steve Johnson,

who is obviously going to be there. But is – Hamill is supposed to be healthy by Sunday. Is that right? Yeah, it wasn't definite, but he threw 73 pitches or something, and it sounded like he would be ready to go on Sunday. So there's Hamill, there's McDonnell, and Tillman. Yeah, well, Chen is going to be there, I assume. So you've got Hamill, Chen, and probably Gonzalez and Tillman?

Yeah, and I guess Saunders isn't in it just because Saunders is pitching the first round of the playoffs, which is one game. Saunders might not be in it anyway. Saunders is pitching a whole round of the playoffs, by any chance. He is, that's true. But after that, this might actually be the only—I don't know this, but this might be the only time Joe Saunders gets to pitch. Which is weird because it's like Miguel Gonzalez would replace him in the rotation. He's pitching the most important game. He is pitching the equivalent of a game seven for them, and he might not start anymore for them. Or he might. He might start instead of Gonzalez, especially if he pitches well. That's the sort of thing that managers tend to hang on to. Well, with Gonzalez, didn't he strike out like seven or eight guys in his last start,

which is weird because he doesn't strike people out? Strikes out more than Saunders. Well, who doesn't? I was surprised that Showalter decided to start Saunders even if he was the right move because you don't often see a manager go with the guy who has that bat a track record against one team or in one park when the choices are fairly but sure does what he wants yeah uh oh man i'm glad he said the steve johnson his knee might have had something to do with that so that's possible too but his dad pitched for the oriole yes and at least we talked about him at length.

You can't criticize the fighting show, Walters. So we can wrap this up. We thank Mark Normandin for joining us. I accept your thanks. And very intimately shared one microphone and one pair of headphones with me. And you can read his work at Baseball Nation if you want to read about some general baseball stuff or at Over the Monster if you want to read about Red Sox stuff.

You do. Yes. By the way. Yeah, you should. And thanks for listening. Watch the games tonight along with Baseball Perspectives and we will be back next week.