PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Ep. 9: Why You Should #VoteKetel, Lamb's Return, Greinke's Epic Homer, & More

Episode Date: June 26, 2019

We discuss Ketel Marte's breakout season and why he undoubtedly deserves to start at 2B for the National League. We also talk about Jake Lamb's return to the lineup, what to do with a struggling Archie Bradley, and much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to episode nine of the Rattle Podcast. As always, I'm your host, Jesse Freepin, alongside Jeff Weiser, my co-hosts here on the Rattle podcast. And Jeff, I mentioned this to you off the air just a moment ago. Zach Buchanan, who does a great job covering the Diamondbacks for the Athletic, tweeted during his press conference with Tori Lavello that apparently members of the media who are at this press conference to stop what they're doing. get out their phones and vote for Catelle Marte.

And Jeff, I think we'd be remiss if we started our show in any other way than telling our audience to stop what you're doing, even if it means pressing pause on this episode, go get your phone if you don't have it already and vote for Catele. Yeah, vote Catell. He's easily the most deserving Diamondback at this point. And, you know, as we were talking, you know, it's, I don't. normally get behind these things like from a fan perspective so much but i think you made a pretty good point that he's really just the best uh player available at that position yeah absolutely no doubt this is definitely not you know just me or jeff you know wanting the diamondbacks players to do

well in in the all-star voting even if they don't deserve it could tell marty by numbers comparing him with azi albies of the braves and mike moustakis who's also in this three-man race. And he is the guy in pretty much every single category. And he's made that extremely clear as of late. He is simply, or as of yesterday, Catelle-Marte has set a franchise record with eight consecutive multi-hit games, which I believe Luis Gonzalez had the previous record in Diamondbacks history with seven such games.

One for 33, which is a 636 batting average, for those of you. keeping score at home. So Cotel Marte has really evolved this season for the Diamondbacks. And Jeff, even since our last show, it's felt like, you know, Cotel went from being a really good player to, you know, maybe even looking like kind of an elite player out there. Now his batting average is up well over 300 at 314. His OPS is right around 950.

Pretty much across B. And I mean, can we say like a franchise cornerstone at this point? Is he to that level yet? You know, production-wise, I mean, currently I think his pace is probably something that, you know, would be frankly kind of shocked if he continued to hit, you know, 314 with a 584 slugging percentage the rest of the season. But when you look at what he's going to be paid over the life of his extension and what he can produce, I think he is a cornerstone.

he's going to you know he'll continue to be probably one of the top producing offensive players we've seen the defensive flexibility that he offers so he gives tori lavella some some options there and then he's not a burden on the payroll by any means so this is the kind of thing that you like i don't i don't mean this in the way it may sound but this is kind of what paul goldschmidt offered the diamondbacks right um you know, a younger player locked in early, financially producing, and just opens up a bunch of other doors where you can then, you know, reinvest and spend money in other areas. You know, whether or not the club, you know, does reinvest that cash, you know, is to be seen

down the road. But I think he is kind of like a, maybe I'd prefer the term building block to cornerstone. But I think we're saying essentially the same thing. Just so everyone knows how the voting will work, this is the so-called primary vote of the All-Star election. They're starting to use all this political jargon for some reason. But anyway, the situation as far as voting is concerned is you can vote between right now the voting is open as we speak at this moment. You can vote on Google, which is a new thing this year. You can also vote, as usual, at debacks.com and wiped clean.

So I believe Hital Marte was trailing one or I think maybe both of these guys in the voting, in the starters voting that happened earlier, ended a few days ago. But that slate has been wiped completely clean. We start from zero. So it's a 28-hour period. It's open right now. It ends at 4 p.m. Eastern time tomorrow, talking about Thursday. So there's all your details on voting.

Be sure to go ahead and get that done. Not the game, right? We want the best players to be in the All-Star game. And Catelle-Marté in a Diamondbacks uniform has certainly done that this season. And Jeff, to your point about the contract, he is under control through 2024, just to give fans some perspective on this. The Diamondbacks have him locked for sure through 2022. Then they have team options for 2023 and 2024 with this extension. Sedona Red for many years to come, and I think that is absolutely a good thing and something that fans are going to be excited to watch for many years to come.

I want to move on to a newcomer to the Diamondbacks, and a guy that many people may have forgotten about because he's been out on the injured list for an extensive period of time. He believed he played not more than just several games, about a week of games at the beginning of the season before. injuring his quad the lineup in an afternoon game between the diamond backs and the Dodgers here today. He's coming off a rehab assignment in Reno. The diamond back selected to send him there to maybe help him get his timing back a little bit before being thrown back into the Major League level. Lamb's numbers in the rehab assignment, not particularly impressive.

He was 7 for 39, which is a 179 batting average. He did have a home run, I believe maybe a couple double. as well. Today, Jeff, what do you think the Diamondbacks are going to do here? This opens up kind of a weird situation, something we've anticipated for a while. Christian Walker has been a pretty steady presence over at first base. Eduardo Escobar, of course, has had a good season over at third base. So there isn't really a clear path here for Jake Lamb to get into the lineup every day.

Maybe that's a good thing. Jeff, what do you think the Diamondbacks are going to do? How are they going to handle this situation? You know, first and foremost, I think if there's a path for the Diamondbacks to really, you know, kind of jump back into the contention picture, this is kind of how it has to go. They really have to have a guy like Jake Lamb almost act as a trade acquisition. Of course, they already had him on the roster. But in a sense, he's like a bit of new blood. And they really need him to click.

So this is probably their biggest opportunity to like make a push. I mean, the trade deadline is now essentially, you know, a month out, maybe, you know, four and a half weeks. So if they can do some damage, you know, in the next four and a half weeks, I think that's really the thing that could propel them into, you know, really trying to make a push for it. I don't know if Jake Lamb is up to the task. we don't really know how healthy he is, but we'll certainly find out shortly. I think this is where, you know, right back to Cotel Marte,

but I think this is where he becomes so valuable because you can put Jake Lamb in the lineup at third base, slide Eduardo Escobar to second, kick Cotel Marte back to center field, you know, and move a guy maybe like Gerard Dyson into right where the defense probably picks up a little bit. And so, you know, the kind of people that we'll probably see a little less playing time because of this, you know, will likely be

uh, will likely be guys like Tim LaCastro, um, you know, might be a guy like, uh, you know, Christian Walker at times when, when maybe the matchup is a little as favorable. So I think they'll, they'll sort of move the pieces around. And I wouldn't be surprised to see them kind of slow play lamb back into the lineup. Uh, I would guess he gets some days off and they're going to probably really monitor that because I think they know that for them to really make a push, he needs to be healthy and he needs to be producing. So I wouldn't be shocked if they take it easy with him a little bit. But I think that's kind of the way we see it go. I think Kattel Marte probably bounces around a whole bunch. When Lamb's not in the lineup, you know,

it probably looks, the configuration looks a lot like what we've seen over the last couple weeks. When he is in the lineup, if he's at third base, you probably see Kattel, you know, bump the center field and then things get kind of redistributed from there. You mentioned the possibility of the Diamondbacks maybe being able to make a run this season into the playoffs. And it's really kind of weird because the Diamondbacks have lost 7 out of 10. It's several weeks now. But neither of a lot of other teams. The Rockies have faltered a little bit.

The Brewers have also lost 7 out of 10 games. The Phillies have also lost 7 out of 10 games. The Cardinals are 5 in their last 10. So a lot of the teams that the Diamondbacks are contending up against, have also not played particularly well. And as of today, the Diamondbacks somehow are still just two games out of a wild card spot, despite all that they've played over the last few weeks. I think it's a hard decision to make as far as, you know, buy or sell.

We've talked about this many times on the show. Although the Diamondbacks are close, it is certainly a crowded race. Right now you've got the Brewers in the first wildcard spot, the Colorado Rockies and Philadelphia Phillies are tied for the second wild card spot. Then it goes the Cardinals who are just a half game out. Then it's the Diamondbacks who are also tied with the Padres. And then the walk things up as of late, which I think a lot of us expected, they're just a half game behind a Diamondbacks.

And then, heck, the Pirates and the Reds are just two games away after that. So although the Diamondbacks are certainly really, really close, there's also just quite a few teams in this race. You could make an argument that there's probably seven or maybe even eight teams who really have a shot at this thing and there's only two spots. And so the Diamondbacks have to, you know, look themselves in the mirror, ask themselves honestly, is it in the top two out of these seven teams that are chasing after this thing right now?

And personally, Jeff, I think I still have my doubts about that. Yeah, I do too. At least as currently constructed, I think if Jake Lamb was a real shot in the arm, I mean, let's say he comes back and, you know, finds a way to hit, you know, 270 with a bunch of home runs and looks like a steady presence in the lineup. You know, maybe that changes the math a little bit and compels them to go out and, you know, grab an arm. I mean, they could still use the rotation help.

The bullpen has been shaky, and I wrote about that yesterday. You know, they're going to need a couple pieces if they want to try to kind of surge ahead. But to even make that determination, they probably need to gain some. ground. I mean, it's been, you know, a good week, followed by a bad week, followed by, you know, a good week, followed by a bad week. I mean, the swings back and forth, there's just like, no telling which direction this team is going. I mean, can they be good for a longer period of time or where they fall off, you know, for a longer period of time? So I think it's, it's been, it's been really tough to find any consistency. There just seems to be these big swings, you know,

back and forth. And, you know, when that happens, I tend to think the truth just lies in the middle. And that's probably a team that isn't quite there. I do think it's interesting that with so many clubs competing for that wildcard spot in the National League, I think like 13 teams are really kind of still in the race of 15. So that's probably going to reduce the market of sellers. And it may increase the market of buyers. It may just have some interesting market effects,

and it might push the team if they do want to make some trades to deal to American League clubs, just because so many teams in the National League, unless a team like Cincinnati decides to pull out of this thing early, you know, it might be hard to find, you know, trade partners in the National League. But I tend to think that they're just a little bit short. I mean, Alex Young is going to make a start on Saturday.

You know, he had been kind of a little bit. failed starter that had turned into a relief pitcher and they've now been working it back into the rotation just for this kind of rotation depth. I mean, they're really digging into guys like in Reno with ERAs over five and six just to fill the rotation out. So that's something that has to be addressed if they're going to make a move. In some sense or another, they might kind of be compelled to acquire a starting pitcher of some kind at the trade deadline, even if they're not, you know, really thinking of going for it per se because right now what we've seen over the last few weeks has just been unwatchable on some days when Zach Godley has been thrown out there.

Taylor Clark was pretty good early on after being called up from Reno, but he has really struggled. His ERA is up at the start today against the Dodgers and the matinee games. That'll be interesting to see how he fares there. But I just don't know if the Diamondbacks, even if they're not going for it, you know, two out of every five games almost feel like they're lost at this point in the season. So even if, you know, when Merrill Kelly, Robbie Ray or Zach Granky are on the mound, if you can win two of those three games, the Diamondbacks are still pretty much

automatically losing the fourth and fifth games because those starters are just not keeping them in. Even if you are going to sell, you still need to add some depth. The Diamondbacks have gone through a lot of depth, Duplanteer, of course, is on the injured list. Luke Weaver also on the injured list, not sure if we're really going to be able to see him at any point this season. And the list goes on of pitchers, the Diamondbacks have tried in the rotation that just haven't worked out. And I think no matter what you're doing, you've got to fill one of those spots because

these guys, I don't think it's good to run these guys out there, but I think it's bad for them. Like Taylor Clark, I don't think is really learning a whole lot at the Major League level right now, just getting slapped around every fifth day. I mean, maybe there is something to be gained from that, but you have to feel a better role might be fit for a guy like Taylor Clark at this stage in his career. And you certainly don't want to put him in a position where he's filling a role that he's just not ready to fill yet. Right. It puts the team at a detriment for sure. And let's not forget one of the other guys that they thought they were going to get back at some point the season was Taiwan Walker. It doesn't look like that's going to happen either.

So, yeah, a guy like Taylor Clark, you know, he probably profiles best as like, you know, a spot starter in multiple innings of kind of middle relief from the bullpen. Instead, you know, he's pitching like a regular starter. And maybe there is a lesson to be learned for him. You know, maybe you see how he can adjust. But the stuff itself doesn't really suggest that he's going to be any kind of frontline starter and is even fringy kind of for a back of the rotation spot. So I think we're kind of in a situation with him where the teams evaluating his performance. He's probably evaluating, you know, and trying to learn quickly, like on the fly. You know, sticking him back in Reno, I don't know how useful that is for him in terms of becoming a better pitcher.

So maybe this is, you know, maybe the exposure to the majors is the right move. However, you know, doing it every fifth day in a starter's capacity on a team that would like to, make a push for the postseason might not be, you know, exactly the right recipe there. The Diamondbacks even, it still strikes me just to think back on this. I was shocked when I originally saw the news. The Diamondbacks used Archie Bradley in a starting in a starting spot. I'm certainly not a member of the rotation. It was really just kind of a one-time thing. Either a guy who's really talked for years about how much he wants to get back into the rotation at some point in his career. But it certainly,

certainly didn't go well for him. And frankly, Jeff, things at large have not gone very well for Archie Bradley as of late. As ERA is up nearing six at this point at 566. I remember a time when, you know, we didn't really think Archie Bradley had his best stuff, but somehow his ERA was still in the ones and the twos. And now we're all the way up to five, six, and you to struggle this season. I don't think he's this bad. I don't know if we can really think that a guy who just a couple years ago was one of the best relievers in the entire game can really fall off to this degree. His FIP is 361 for whatever that's worth. So that suggests that maybe he's been a little bit unlucky.

His opposing hitters have a babbip of 400 off of him, which also seems certainly destined to come down at least a little bit. So I think he's, Mark Grace asked a serious question on a post-game show the other day to the other guys, I think he asked it to Bob Brenley on the post-game show on the TV side. And he basically just said, what good does it do, Archie Bradley and the Diamondbacks, for that matter, to continue to run this guy out there in situations where he's just not succeeding. And you, you know, you look at the numbers and you see that he's getting unlucky, at least to some degree.

He probably is a better pitcher than he's shown. Where Archie Bradley is just not a guy you necessarily want in the big league level, or I guess maybe it's just a matter of switching his role so that he's really just strictly used in more of a mop-up situation rather than these bigger moments that Tori Lavello has really continued to use him in. What is the role for a guy like this? Yeah, it's a really tough call. You know, and without, let's face it, it's not like the Diamondbacks have a bunch of bullpen aces down in Reno that they could just call on. So that's really tough. I mean, Jimmy Shurfi has pitched well in limited opportunities, but he's a guy with some flaws of his own.

And so, you know, trying to figure out how to use Archie, you know, we've talked about it before. It's really difficult to make modifications in season for relievers when you never know when they're going to be called on. And, you know, the piece that I wrote yesterday, I mean, really the, you know, Toro Lavello has basically three weapons at his disposal in the bullpen that he probably feels pretty confident. with. And I'd say one of those is even a little shaky. Greg Holland has been pretty consistent. Yes, he had a bad outing here recently, but he's been pretty consistent. And I think you know night to night what you're going to get with him. Andrew Chafin has been, you know, in my opinion, and by some of the metrics, the team's best reliever. Andrew Chaffin is a really good relief pitcher. I think he's really underrated.

And Yon Lopez has had excellent outcomes. However, the underlying indicators would suggest he hasn't been nearly as good as probably the ERA looks. So with that said, those are three arms that Lavello has, you know, kind of at his disposal, but you can't just use those three guys all the time. And so you're going to get Yoshihara when it's a little wild. Or Archie Bradley, when he, you know, can't find the corners of the strike zone and only can find the heart of it. He's just, Lavello has to use those guys.

I mean, he has to have guys to pitch innings. it's Matt Andresa is not better. T.J. McFarland is not better. He's just stuck using them. So I think, you know, maybe by acquiring someone, they're able to push Archie Bradley out of some of those moments. And maybe that allows him some time and space to work where he comes in in the sixth inning, you know, with a four-run lead or down four runs. And he's able to just kind of work like pressure-free. that might be a route that they could go.

But honestly, I mean, they're just, I think if there was an easy answer here, we would have seen it already. Yeah, I think absolutely. I think that's a great point. One thing I think we certainly have to mention here on the show is that Zach Rankie homered off of his former co-ace in Los Angeles, Clayton Kershaw,

one of the greater moments in Diamondbacks history, at least a few, season is now hitting 306 with a 342 on base percentage, a 667 slugging percentage. He has six extra base hits, three home runs, a triple, and a couple of doubles and 41 plate appearances. Zach Ranky, this just really continues to get better from my standpoint, Jeff. And I know you have another alarming fun fact that you'd love to give our listeners as well. Yeah, I was just kind of digging through after I saw it, after I saw a guy. Granky Homer again and I looked and he has he's had 41 plate appearances this year which is obviously

well short of qualifying for the batting crowd but I was like you know the ball is really flying like we all know this let me look like let me look at qualified hitters and Granky has you know as many or more home runs than than four qualified hitters these are all guys with 245 plate appearances or more you know and so I was like Joe Panic Adam Fraser Hanser Alberto and Miguel Rojas of the Marlins plays just about every day and still hasn't hit a home run yet this year. That seems almost impossible on today's run environment, but, you know, I don't know, man. Maybe, you know, maybe the real solution here is just to make Zach Granky the two-way player. You know, I was actually at Wrigley Field the other day in a conversation that I was having with my brother, who was in the stands with me, was if you put nine Zach Granky,

I guess, hey, heck, let's go 25 of them. Let's say you can have 25 of any single player to make a team out of. And I was making the argument that the team with the 25 Zach Grankies might be better than the team of 25 whatever other players you want to throw out there. Because Granky is obviously a great pitcher. So as far as pitching goes, you're covered with one of the better guys in the game. and his ability to run the bases and play defense, and you'd score maybe a run or two every game on average

with Granky at the plate every time. And your pitching is certainly going to keep you in the game. And so I personally was relatively convinced that Zach Granky by himself might make the best baseball team out of anyone in the major leagues. Yeah, outside of a healthy showy Otani, who is not healthy right now, when he is the Zat Granky team probably loses

the World Series to show Yotani but he gets to the World Series Right That would be a fun simulation to run Oh absolutely I don't know if there's

You know maybe you guys have some buttons over a baseball prospectus Yeah maybe you have some simulation you can run over there to see what that would look like We have some interesting questions submitted to the show

here for this episode, Matthew, one of our good long-time listeners, he asks, if Catelle Marte does accept, should we fear the infamous post-derby collapse? This is, of course, something that's had a pretty long storyline over quite a few years, kind of just the idea that if a player participates in the home run derby, their swing is messed up somehow. Maybe they start focusing on the power elements a little bit too much and that plagues into, you know, their everyday game after the All-Star break is over. The mentions of Cotell Marte necessarily making the home run derby, so this is not necessarily

something that anyone will even have to worry about. But Jeff, do you think there is something to this storyline of, you know, players really struggling after the home run derby because it alters their swing in some way? Yeah, I think there's, there have been some, there have been some studies done. you know, on this topic. And I think that by and large, it's shown that the sort of the myth of the post-derby collapse is a little overstated. There are plenty of, there are plenty of players that this has happened to. But at the same time, we look at what usually gets a guy in the home run derby in the first place.

That's generally seeing a lot of home run in the first half. Well, you know, by and large, those guys aren't actually on pace to continue, you know, like regression is going to come. You know, for example, the current league leader in home runs is Cody Bellinger with, no, excuse me, not Cody Bellinger, Christian Yellich with 29. Do we really think Christian Yelich is going to hit 60 home runs this year? I don't know, man. That baseball is seriously juice, apparently. I'm going to guess he ends up short of 60. I'll take the under on that. I do think Christian Yelich is a fantastic baseball player. I do think the baseball is juiced.

I'm still going to take the under. And so I think, you know, so if he ends up at the all-star break, you know, let's say Christian Yelich is in the home run derby. And at that point, he has 35 home runs. You know, if he only hits 20 over the remainder of the season, is that really a slump? First is that just kind of more about what we would expect. So I think it's a kind of a tricky thing to look at as it pertains to Catele Marte. You know, he's been absolutely on fire over the last, you know, eight to 10 games.

And really over the last month, do I think he's going to keep up that toward pace? Probably not. So it may look like a collapse, but honestly, it would probably be more like just getting back to expectations. We have another question about the Diamondbacks movement at the trade deadline from Matt Steele. he says given the team is looking more and more like not buyers at the trade deadline do you think they will actually sell anything he mentions the idea of robbie ray who seems like a perfect deadline sell player but given the team's lack of a fourth and fifth starter for the lot to sell a guy like ray matt i think that's a great question i'll go ahead and start with my opinion and then i'll pass it over to you jeff this is something that i have also a really really

wondered about because I think although things might set up kind of nicely for the diamondbacks to deal Robbie Ray maybe trying to get something good back for a young relatively controllable starter like Robbie Ray and a guy who certainly has a very high ceiling. I think we interested, namely the Houston Astros, in a guy like Robbie Ray. But the diamondbacks are really in a tough spot right now with, you know, like we talked about earlier in the show, they don't have a fourth or a fifth starter right now. They literally just have three guys at the top. And if you trade one of those three guys, then things get really, really thin at the back end of your rotation. And I mean, I mentioned it before. I think whether the

diamond backs are going in or out this seed, who can start at the major league level regardless. And so if you trade Robbie Ray, I think in some sense, you might need to get two of those guys, regardless of if you're going in or out this season. So I think it's possible that the Diamondbacks deal Robbie Ray still, but I think it really means that they would probably have to get two starting pitchers. And I think that is a tall order and frankly probably not something that I would expect. So I think all Diamondbacks dealt Robbie Ray in part due to this reason that Map brings up. Yeah, and I mean, we're looking at an organization that has been

resistant to the idea of just, you know, full out tanking. So, I mean, could they fill up the rotation? Sure, I'm sure. They could continue with Alex Young there. They could promote Braden Shipley. They could go out on the market and probably make some low-key trades for some, you know, number five starters on bad teams to fill out the rotation. I mean, sure they could.

The results would not be pretty. and I don't know that they really want to go there. They have Robbie Ray under contract or under control, at least, I should say, for a season beyond this one. And my guess is they're probably going to hold on to that. I just don't see. I mean, if you look at where the team is now and you project ahead six months, put us in the offseason, you know, you're looking at a team that you're like, well, okay. Like we have some offensive depth We can hit the baseball

We have a few arms that are pretty good That are under control We'll probably get Taiwan Walker back I don't think they're throwing the towel in on this thing I think they probably Hold on look for another year and say Okay you know we're not really losing much We could be competitive again

And with a couple of low-key moves Like maybe we're able to bolster the bullpen Maybe we get a Taiwan walker back and maybe we find another starter or, you know, John de Pontier becomes healthy and finishes the season strong. And you start looking at the Diamondbacks and going, you know, this team might be just a little bit better than the R. 2019.

So I don't know that I see them doing it. I think they'd really need to get a lot back for that. And I just don't know that it's out there. Yeah, yeah, I think I agree. And I would also add to that that Robbie Ray, although he certainly has nearly as well as he's capable, at least as well as we've. seen him in the past and you'd hate to see yeah and you'd hate to see you know a guy who you've waited

on for this long and worked with for this long you'd hate to you know deal him when he's not at his best get something a little bit less than what you could have once gotten for a guy like robbie ray and then you know who knows maybe you you wind up ultimately watching him find success with another team i think it's a good point for now that now that luke weaver is here and and did what what he did over this last season. Hopefully he's healthy next season. We still have to see how the UCL pans out and everything with him. But on paper, you know, you run out there a rotation of Granky, Robbie Ray, Luke Weaver,

Taiwan Walker, and Merrill Kelly. You know, that's a pretty good starting five on paper. And I mean, you've got John DuPontier as depth there as well. And, you know, maybe even certainly things may not work out quite that well for the Diamondbacks. that seems very optimistic on the injury front with all of those guys coming back and being healthy to start next season. But I think you make a good point, Jeff. There's a reason the Diamondbacks didn't go out and completely blow this thing up when they definitely could have. And some people thought they should have.

I think they still see enough depth on this team as far as position players go and in that starting rotation. I'll be it, the bullpen needs some potentially fix. I think they do have a shot to go out there. next year and maybe give this thing a run and really try to contend like they have in the last couple of seasons. Yeah, and we have to look to. I mean, I'm not exactly sure. I haven't done the research.

But, you know, I mentioned before there's about 13 National League teams that are really kind of in the hunt. You know, you probably figure that a couple of those teams are going to have some key players expire, move on. You know, so maybe the competition gets a little weaker too and your odds increase. So, yeah, I'm not anticipating any sort of burn down here. Well, you got a question from Andy Johnson while we were recording here. Let's see.

So he wants to know. He mentions, I've seen the twins invest in new coaches and player development techniques and the organization from top to bottom. All of those kinds of things seem to be on the rise. He asked, what sort of changes have the Diamondbacks made to their player development system? He says, I read an article about Mike Bissado, while twins, pitching coach, West Johnson embraces that sort of information, acts as a conduit between the front office and the players. Jeff, I think you probably know more about this than I probably would.

Are there any adjustments to the player development system that you've seen the Diamondbacks make as of late? Yeah, under Mike Hazen's leadership, they've taken a big step forward. I think this was an organization that was previously considered to be, you know, pretty well behind the times. And I think in a few quick years has made up a lot of ground in that regard. The Diamondbacks are a team that used Edgertronic cameras in spring training. So the Rapsoto and the Edgatronic are kind of the two devices that have typically been used, you know, I've typically been used, you know, to improve pitching primarily, but can be used for hitters as well. So they're using that technology.

I can't speak to the article that this person is referencing, but they have used those things. We've seen, like, trackman systems installed in all the minor league complexes. You know, that's been going on now for two years. Kind of coincided with Mike Hazen, you know, coming aboard. I was actually just speaking with someone with the Hillsborough Hopps. I was out there on Monday. And they talked about the food budget and the food that's provided for players. Like the budget that the club gets to feed its players has increased significantly every year for the last few years.

Interesting. Players are, yeah, players are eating better. They're eating healthier. There are, you know, better diet plans for the players. So things like that. I mean, you've even seen things where during batting practice at minor league games, they will put, you know, kind of the pitching screen or some of the screens up in front of the plate and make the hitters, like, launch the ball over the screen to, like, just get them to, like, just get them to, quit hitting the ball on the ground. So I think there's a lot going on.

I think the Diamondbacks are now kind of more, you know, towards the forefront. I don't know if they are, you know, a Dodgers or a Yankees or, you know, some of the clubs, the Astros, the Rays that are, you know, the Oakland A's, but I think they're making up ground pretty quickly. So from that standpoint, I think they've done a lot to come, you know, to come into the modern game and really embrace it. Yeah, absolutely. It's a Princeton grad.

The Diamondbacks have really taken much more of an analytics take on the game, really, really ever since Mike Hayes arrived here in Arizona. I think it's a good thing. The Diamondbacks were kind of laughed at by some people for a while just because they really were so old school and just so kind of behind the times when it comes to the analytics that are present in the game of baseball. Yeah, one other piece I would add would just be that the team does, like even the minor league clubs have direct contact with the front office on a daily basis.

They're getting reports. They're getting data. And they're shifting all over the place. I mean, even in Hillsborough when I was there Monday, you know, they would move all over the field based on the batter in the situation. And then I watched their opponent. They were playing Vancouver. And they would play like, you know, pull hitters just like straight up.

Like the defenders just didn't move. Interesting. So that's like stuff that you see that you're like, okay. So like not only are they buying into it at the big league level, but they're teaching the kids how to do it down below as well. That's really interesting. Jeff, I know you also talking about your time at Hillsborough, you've gotten to see the Diamondbacks outfield prospect,

Christian Robinson down there, who's certainly pretty highly touted. Here we've heard about him a lot. he's by most people ranked a top five prospect. I know the season down there started pretty recently, but what have you seen so far from the Diamondback Southfield prospect, Christian Robinson? You know, physically, he's a very imposing force.

Everything you've read or heard is, you know, is pretty accurate. I mean, he just, you don't see baseball players that look like, you know, NFL linebackers very often. I mean, he's a huge dude. he's probably not that big he's not you know not filled out in that way but he's listed at six three two 20 and i would believe it um he runs he runs very well he's smooth he's he's not super quick out of the box but the top end speed is there he's very fast in that regard um you know i think the thing that i was most you know kind of concerned with coming into the season and was watching

closely was he did strike out quite a bit um you know and really in his debut last year and um you know did good things when he put the bat on the ball, but he did strike out a bit. And I watched him just receive a steady diet of breaking balls and off speed pitches low and away from opposing pitchers, both left and right-handed.

And he rolled over those pitches, like in his first three of bats. I mean, he would swing at them and just roll over to the shortstop. One of them, he actually notched an infield hit, but it was still a soft hit the ball.

and he was really giving him trouble. And his fourth at bat, he got to two strikes, and they continued to work him with soft stuff away. And I watched him just sit back, take it, and flip the ball to right field with actually quite a bit of authority. The ball just makes a different sound off his bat than most of those other kids down there. You know, and it was really like he knew how he was going to be attacked,

and he adjusted. He'd been getting a steady diet of that. that stuff. And he was like, you know what? That's what they're going to throw me. And this is what I'm going to do with it. He does that. I think they're either runners on the corners or bases loaded. He drives and runs, you know, does his job. And it was really impressive to see him adjust, you know, and really, you know, just make that change on the fly. And I think that's the kind of growth that you got to see out of the young guys. I mean, they got to figure that out. I mean, if he just continues, you know, rolling over those pitches or swinging and missing at them,

like that's a problem, but to see him, you know, the tender young age of 18 that he is, you know, make that change is really encouraging. So far, obviously, it's only 11 games. It's an extremely small sample size, but it's looked pretty good for Christian Robinson. So far, he's hitting 341, 420 on base, 500 slugging percentage so far. The strikeouts, like you mentioned, which have been a problem for him in his young career. He does have quite a few 17 strikeouts in 44 at bat. that'll be something to continue to monitor. He does have four stolen bases as well, which in 11

games is a pretty big number. Jeff bought in for you as far as, you know, the grand scheme of the Diamondbacks prospects in their pipeline. Do you see Robinson is kind of right behind Jazz Chisholm? I know they're actually from the same city in the Bahamas, I believe, which is actually really interesting. But do you see him as, you know, maybe a top five guy? Maybe is he a top three guy in their system where does this guy slot in obviously he's very young very raw we still have a lot of you know for he could ever make it to the major league level but he's only 18 years old like you said and it feels like it's been a while since the diamondbacks have had a guy who who flashes the potential that he does it's so young and age you know he's a top three prospect for me

um i did my prospect rankings uh back at inside the zana before we started this venture And I did those last fall. And I placed Robinson second behind John de Pontier. I may be a little more lukewarm on jazz chisholm than some. I just, you know, some of the things that I was concerned about last fall have manifested themselves this year with the strikeouts, you know, the lack of ability to put the ball into play regularly. you know, just the power is there and he can swing wildly, but I think, you know, that's just, that approach is a really hard one to pull off. There aren't a lot of guys that can do it, and I don't know if he's one of them.

Whereas with Robinson, I think, you know, he looks like the kind of guy that, you know, just physically, from a physically imposing standpoint, I mean, there just are not very many players that have the physical tools that he does. And a lot of the guys that do have those tools are in the major leagues. They're just physically able to do things that other guys physically cannot. So with him, I think you're looking at probably like a low upside of kind of like an everyday outfielder. You know, with the upside of, you know, a guy that's probably like a perennial All-Star. Whereas with Chisholm, I think you could get, you know, some All-Star-type seasons out of him.

But I also see a guy who could just, you know, make so little contact and have such little discipline. at the plate that ultimately he ends up, you know, probably, you know, washing out or getting very little, like, Major League time. So I'll kind of take, I'll take Robinson there. You know, and I do think he is listed as a center fielder looking at the body and just looking at, you know, certain aspects of his build. I do think he probably moves to right field probably sooner than later. But that's fine. He'll be a terrific right fielder. You wrote an article just recently about the Diamondbacks bullpen calling a spade a spade, which is something that we've certainly talked about here on the show.

I want to make sure all of our listeners are aware of that. Head on over to the rattle.net. Check out that article. Jeff has also posted during his time visiting the Vizalia Rawhide. So all of those are up on our website at therattle.net as well. So be sure to check all of that out. Thank you so much for listening to this ninth. episode of the Rattle podcast.

That is all that we have for this one. If you haven't already, be sure to give us a follow on Twitter at the Rattle AZ. And as I mentioned, check out our website at therattle.net. Excuse me, where you can find some really cool and exciting interoper to check out over there. Once again, vote for Cattell Marte. I think that's the big thing for today. Make sure you go ahead and do that. You've got until 4 p.m. Eastern time on.

Thursday. So be sure to take advantage of that and make Coutel Marte, the starting second basement in the National League, which I think he certainly deserves, as we talked about during the show. Thank you so much once again for listening, and we will be back next week here on the Rattle Podcast.