PHNX Arizona Diamondbacks Podcast - Fangraphs' ZiPS projections for the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2023 are giving us life

Episode Date: December 16, 2022

Dan Szymborski and Fangraphs released their 2023 ZiPS projections for the Arizona Diamondbacks, and things are getting exciting. We are discussing Corbin Carroll and Brandon Pfaadt being projected to be two of the best players on the team as well as how much stock you can put in these projections. Remember, as Dan says, incorrect projections are either caused by flaws in the physical reality of the universe or by skillful sabotage. 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.

Hello and welcome to a Friday edition of the PHNX DBAX podcast right here on PHNX. My name is Derek Montia, occasionally known as your mayor of PHNX, and I'm joined by my vice mayor and friend, the one and only thunderstick Jesse Friedman. So Derek, I had a, I had a dream last night that I feel like I have to share real quick. I had a, I had a dream that the Diamondbacks traded Dalton Varsho to the Houston Astros in a three, team trade in which Patrick Corbyn was returning to the Diamondbacks from the Washington Nationals. And there was, I know there was like a bit, there was a big name prospect of some sort returning to the Diamondbacks from the Astros. But just as Robert Murray from fan sided was like unveiling the information on Twitter,

that's when I woke up. Oh no. I don't know who the big name prospect. You don't know how this fictitious situation plays out. All I know is the Diamondbacks traded Dalton Varshow for Patrick Corbyn. And that's more of a nightmare than a dream. Yeah, that's not great. We need Knight Robert Murray to tell us how this plays out.

But of course, the show is brought to you by the fine folks at the Draft King's Sportsbook app, whether you're awake or asleep. That is America's top-rated sportsbook app. Jesse, we have Zips projections to talk about for the Arizona Diamondbacks, which we have hyped up and we are excited about. I promise you they do live up to the expectations, even if the team doesn't live up to those same expectations next year. But before we go on to that, we do have good news for the NL West. Carlos Rodan is a New York Yankee and is out of our lives, Jesse.

No more Carlos Rodon on the San Francisco Giants. What are your thoughts on his moving to New York? Yeah, I tweeted this out yesterday. this was the first move, as far as like big name free agents are concerned, where like the numbers didn't have me gasping like when I first saw them. Like six years, 162 million. It's a lot. It's more than like if I were in the Yankee shoes,

it's still more than maybe I would have been comfortable giving a guy like Rodon with all the shoulder issues he's had in the past that much money. I don't know if I would have been comfortable with that. but but it wasn't you know 11 years 280 million for zander bogarts like it seemed like it was just on a different sort of playing field which i guess makes sense because rodon is is not a short stop right i mean the market for him is just naturally going to be very different than some of the other big name guys but all things considered i actually think the yankees did pretty well for themselves here and it's a big get for them like carlos rodon's a really good pitcher when healthy and and

and like him and Garrett Cole and Nestor Cortez, like that's a pretty, pretty solid front of the rotation for the New York Yankees now. Yeah, that's a formidable one-two punch. If he can stay healthy and put up the same numbers that he did with the Giants last season, speaking of the Giants, their rotation would have been a beast if he would have resigned with San Francisco. So it's very good to see him get out of the division. We haven't talked about it much,

but the San Francisco Giants have added some key pieces. when you talk about their starting rotation. And to be honest, they might not, they might not be the biggest names in baseball, but Sean Mania and Ross Stripling are both very good pitchers. And they already had some pretty good pitchers in their starting rotation as it stood. So I feel like this is a bit of a bullet dodged for the Arizona Diamondbacks, as far as not having the face that three-man rotation of Carlos Rodon,

Ross Stripling, and Sean Mania, as well as, who else? Logan Webb they have over there. Like who else? I mean, they have some good pictures over there. Yeah. So I think their depth chart now is Logan Webb. I mean, he's clearly your number one. He had a 2.90 ERA last year.

Really, really good pitcher. And then you have Alex Cobb. You have Sean Mania. You have Ross Stripling. You have Alex Wood. I feel like his peripherals are better than like his final numbers at the end of the 2020 season. Like he had a he had a five.

0.10 ERA, but he actually, I mean, he had nine Ks per nine, two walks per nine. Those are both really good. His home runs per nine was pretty reasonable. Uh, so I don't know how, I mean, Alex Wood was incredibly unlucky, frankly, to wind up with the ERA that he had. So I think he's a pretty good rotation option for them. And then they also have Jacob Junis as kind of like a depth piece as well. So it's still a decent, a decent lineup of starting pitchers. It feels like the Giants definitely have a type, right? Like all these, like Alex Cobb, Ross Stripling, Alex Wood, like they're all like kind of five-inning guy,

like number four starter types, but they tend to be a lot better than people maybe think they are. And then Sean Mania is a guy who's been a really, really good starter not that long ago. So there's certainly some room for him to be a lot better than how he played last year with San Diego. Well, the Arizona Diamondbacks made a move yesterday agreeing to a two-year contract with right-handed relief pitcher, Scott McGuff, who I called McGruff the crime dog yesterday, and Jesse asked, who was that? Didn't even get the McGriff connection, let alone the actual McGruff crime dog commercials, of course, from the 80s and 90s that Jesse missed out on due to not being born yet. But Scott McGuff, Jesse, two-year deal worth six point. $5.25 million. Obviously, a great deal financially if he ends up working out for the Diamondbacks and being a viable part of this bullpen. But put up some pretty good numbers last season with Japan.

Yeah, it's an interesting, an interesting story. Some people might have been confused. Like, wait, this guy pitches in Japan and his name is Scott McGuff. Like, that doesn't sound like a Japanese name. And just like known Korean Merrill Kelly, you know what I mean? Right, right. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, this isn't, this isn't Shantaro Fujimami like we were talking about, talking about the other day. But, but yeah, he's pitched the last four years over in Japan.

And he's had some really good seasons. Most recently in 2022, McGuff pitched 53 and two-thirds innings out of the bullpen, 59 strikeouts, only 13 walks at 2.35 ERA, 0.97 whip, 38 saves. He acted as the closer for his team. In Japan, he's done that for the last couple of years. And talking with Mike Hazen about this move yesterday, he talked about McGuff being an option, a guy who he expects to pitch in the back end of the Diamondbacks bullpen, which is bullish, right, for a guy coming over from Japan. You know, you never really know exactly how that transition is going to go. McGuff did pitch in the majors way back in 2015.

He logged six and two-thirds innings for the Marlins at an ERA of 9.45. Things weren't going particularly well for him here in the big leagues. He was kind of a minor league journeyman for a couple of years after that and then made the move over to Japan. And now he's headed back to the U.S. after having some pretty posting some pretty good numbers during his time overseas. I have a lot of faith, believe it or not, in Peter Wardell, which is the Arizona Diamondbacks International Scouting Director. I think that he does a great job in taking a look at his team.

Obviously, he's not the only one involved with that. I know that I'm sure Jason Parks, the director of professional scouting, is involved as well as Josh Barfield. But I think that they just, they do a good job of taking a look at these guys from leagues like the KBO and the Napaon baseball. you know, and finding some, some key guys that aren't going to cost what some relievers or some other players that are in Major League Baseball right now are going to cost. However, they're looking for an opportunity. They want to come back to the States and be a part of MLB. And to be honest, they want to prove themselves. It's a very high level of baseball in Korea and Japan.

So there's no reason why if these guys are able to find success over there that they can't find success here. Plus, you have the infrastructure in place with the coaching staff. that they feel like if this guy's doing this well there, can you imagine getting them here and partnering them up with Brent Strom? I think that is still a big part of what the direction the Diamondbacks are going in. They're not necessarily looking at the ERA of certain guys or their performance or even where they perform, but maybe the advanced metrics and, you know, those numbers showing them how good they're capable of being or how good they could potentially get to.

I definitely know they're looking for guys that throw hard. How is he hitting triple digits? Because that's something, that's a requirement, right? No triple digits. Yeah, no triple digits from Scott McGuff. Mike Hazen said that he's around 93 to 96 with his fastball. He also has a slider and a splitter. So actually, an almost identical arsenal to Shantaro Fujinami,

a guy that we've talked about recently, a guy that was reported by a Japanese news outlet that the Diamondbacks for the front runners to land Shantaro Fujinami. I kind of have my doubts at this point, Derek, about whether the diamondbacks would still do that. A lot of people have asked on Twitter, like, does this take the debacks out of the running for Fujimami?

Not necessarily. I think the debacks, Mike Hazen said yesterday, they are still looking to add to the bullpen. I think it's probably likely we see another move. But I also, their arsenals are very similar. Fujimami is also a fastball splitter slider guy,

so literally identical from a from a pitch standpoint, at least on paper. And then there's also the fact that like, would you really, like if you really want Fujinami and McGuff to pitch out of the back end of your bullpen, would you really be comfortable having two back end guys coming from overseas, like in taking the risk of having two back end guys, you know, transitioning from one league to another when a lot of guys struggle to make that transition. So it's not necessarily impossible. they would still go after Fujinami, but for a variety of reasons,

I would be pretty surprised if that was a move they still were trying to make. Based on last season's lack of success, I would suggest that they don't pick up any back-end guys that share any traits at all. Because last year, they picked up two back-end guys

that were not only closers, but also veterans of Major League Baseball. How did that work out for him, Jesse Friedman? How did that work out? Variety is key. variety is key. Yeah, but I mean, like, thinking about, I tweeted this out from my account yesterday, thinking about where the Diamondback stand in terms of the bullpen, here's sort of where they are.

For lefties, you've got Joe Man Apply, Kyle Nelson, Tyler Holton. Those are the guys on the 40-man roster. And then as far as righties go, you've got Kevin Ginkle, Mark Melanson, Miguel Castro, Scott McGuff, Justin Martinez, guy pitched in the fall league, talked a lot about him recently. Carlos Vargas, a flamethrower they got in that deal with the Cleveland Guardians. And then you've got some depth pieces in Taylor Widener, Edwin Ucita, and Luis Frias. How do we feel about that list, Derek? What I feel like is at least there is new blood in the bullpen.

I feel like they addressed their need. When you look at the number of losses last year, the bullpen by far over any position on the field was the thing that they needed to address. I think that getting involved with other big name free agents provides a bit of a letdown. You know, like our expectation wasn't that they would go into this offseason and go after a Xander Bogarts or even go after a Sean Murphy. But yet here we found ourselves in that position where the Diamondbacks were linked to certain big names, whether it was a trade or a free agency acquisition. And then they don't end up getting them. Thus, this offseason feels like a bit of a letdown. It feels like the Diamondbacks weren't active.

enough, that they didn't do enough to improve their team. However, the one area that they have addressed, and as you noted there, there are a lot of new names in that bullpen. And realistically, the Diamondbacks are looking for guys to step up and accept an opportunity that they are willing to provide. The door is wide open for anybody, not only did be a major part of this bullpen and help this team win games on a regular basis, but the door is wide open for the closer roll, right? There is nobody right now that has any kind of advantage there outside of Mark Melanson. And that's not due to success. That's just based on the fact that he has been a closer in the past.

And, you know, he did have that success with San Diego. So I'm sure his name will still be considered for that closer role. But right now, there's a tremendous amount of opportunity for these young guys in this diamondback's bullpen to step up and be the man that Tori Lovallo can count on. Or at least a couple of these guys can be that for them, right? Yeah. One thing, one thing, though, that you would. addressed in your latest article that is for Debex and PHNX diehards

only is that there is somewhat of a troubling picture for the Arizona Diamondbacks based on some of the numbers that they had in 2022 despite achieving the success that they did. A lot of numbers, a lot of factors are pointing to a potential regression for some of the young guys that had success on this team.

And of course, we hate that. I hate this article. I hate that you did this so much. We're going to get to Zips projections here and it's nothing but popping bottles of champagne and throwing confetti in the air. So if you want a downer, sign up for a diehards membership and read Jesty's

very reasonable, very rational piece because he does make a tremendous amount of sense. He makes a lot of good points. However, I think a lot of it is just based on the fact that the Diamondbacks outperformed their expectations last year. And it almost seems like there is no way for, there is nowhere for some of these guys like Jake McCarthy to go in

23, but down. However, who the hell knows, man? Maybe, maybe these are just some budding superstars that are going to be able to produce at this level in their career going forward. So read Jesse's piece, but don't angrily tweet at him about it if he hurt your feelings, because of course, he hurt mine. But go check that out at go phtonx.com. And if you haven't signed up for a diehard's membership yet, do so. Not only will you get yourself a wonderful piece of merchandise from the PHNx Locker.com now and every year you renew. You'll get 20% off at the PHNXLocker.com. You will get exclusive content like Jesse's newsletter,

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The amount of games you can play, the way that they can track your ball, it's awesome. I love Top Golf. I'm not going to knock Top Golf, but Top Golf tends to be a little confined. You know, this, I like this. This is out. It's free. It's a big open range with no nets. You can hit the ball wherever you want. And I tell me, I can tell you from experience, if you hit the ball outside of the driving range, your computer will tell you that they've notified an attendant to come check on you to make sure you're okay. So make sure you hit the ball straight is my point. No shankin. But make sure to join us, of course,

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Don't miss anything we're doing because we do this for you. And you guys allow us to do this. So we thank you so much for being a diehard member. And even if you're not a diehard member, just for listening, checking out the show, being here with us. Of course, if you are an Arizona Diamondbacks fan, one thing you should be very, very excited about

is Dan Zimborski and FanGrafts, 2023 Zips projections for the Arizona Diamondbacks, which, by the way, I want to start, out by saying that the headline description underneath this article that reads 2023 Zips projections colon Arizona Diamondbacks says and I quote I swear the Diamondbacks did not sponsor these projections right there Jesse my mouth started watering I was like let's fucking go yeah I think at one point Dan also said on his Twitter account that he promises that Brandon Fott's family members didn't hijack his computer in the making of

these projections because they are also. Yeah. Yeah. So let's start with Brandon Fott, right? This is the one. Hold on. Hold on one second. I don't mean to get ahead of you.

I don't mean to stop you there because you were on a roll with Brandon Fought. But I want to get out of the way that under the section for offense for for batting statistics, it starts off by saying, once again, I like to quote this article. It says, let's get the obvious out of the way. Zips really, really likes the Diamondbacks. There's no one else to put it. There's no other way to put it. So let's get into Brandon Fott here, right?

So you've got a guy, you've got a guy who has yet to bitch an inning in the big leagues, right? Brandon Fott could be in the big leagues as soon as opening day of next year, don't necessarily have any guarantees of that. He also, there is a bit of a traffic jam at the D-back starting rotation. So I don't think we can necessarily say that he would be even a starting pitcher necessarily when he gets called up. As we've seen, the Diamondbacks do like to bring guys up and put them in the bullpen to get their feet wet, but they didn't, they resisted doing that with both Dre Jameson and Ryan Nelson. Yeah, I mean, I think if anything, the D-backs have been like kind of stubborn about like, like they like to keep their starters as starters as, as, as, as,

long as they can. But anyway, the numbers here on Brandon Fott are ridiculous. They have him, and this is like over the course of basically a full season, there's certainly no guarantee of him getting this many starts. But in 26 starts, they have Brandon Fott going 152 in a third innings, giving up 139 hit, 62 runs, 32 walks and 153 strikeouts, which is a very, very, very, very low amount of walks, very, very high amount of strikeouts. They have him Derek with a 3.66 ERA, which is

insane. It's hot. Yeah, it's insane. They have him pitching the third most innings, I believe, behind Merrill Kelly and Zach Gallen, which is also very exciting, right? I mean, the idea there that he could

actually have that kind of production and essentially be a more, like, like eat up more innings than Madison Bumgarner is wild to me. You know, and again, like you said, we have no idea of knowing if he's actually going to be here at the beginning of the season.

We have no idea of knowing if he's actually going to be, uh, this good. But yeah, they have him going nine and eight in 26 games, 26 starts. Uh, I also like that they have him giving up only 18 home runs,

uh, as, as, yeah, and we know we've seen him not really give up a lot of home runs. So with that number of innings pitched in his rookie, year. This is an outstanding projection. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, home runs actually were a bit of an issue for him in the minors. That was probably more because of ridiculous ballpark factors.

Because he, you know, spent the entire year in Amarillo and Reno last year. So maybe you don't read too much into that. But yeah. I think that's, I think that's why I found it surprising. You know, again, he has given up a lot of home runs. So like, that's a stat that I wasn't expecting to see that low with a hundred that that many innings pitch 152.3 innings pitch. Yeah, I mean like the the zips are not really like the goal of the zips is not to project playing time. In fact, like with with the part of with the part of the projections that we're that we're looking at right now. I mean, they have like, you know, they let's see, they have Jameson Hill, you know, throwing 111 in two thirds innings, right? Like that's not to say

that Jameson Hill is going to do that. It's just to say that like if he did, you know, this is this is the projection. So don't read this is like Brandon thought is going to throw 152 innings. It's like if he did, this is what this would project his performance to be. Yeah. But there has to be, there is something to be said for them projecting him to play that many innings, right? Because when you look at Ryan Nelson and Dre Jameson, guys that have already made their

major league debuts, they have them pitching less innings as well. So I mean, I feel like Fott's number of innings on these projections has to play up in some way to his skill or something about the way that they feel like he's going to be valued this season to have this much, you know, this many innings. It is, it is sort of, it is sort of confusing how this work. So, so one, one thing to clarify is like if you, if you look at the, uh, like the graphic and, and some of you might have seen this on Twitter. It's like a picture of a baseball diamond, and then, you know, they have the names playing each position

and the war calculation. If you look at that, you'll actually see fought with 1.4 wins above replacement, whereas the projection we were just talking about over 152 innings actually translates to about 2.8 wins above replacement. So there's like one, there's like one part of the projections that it's like, okay, if the guy threw this many innings, you know, hypothetically, this is how he would perform. but the way that the depth chart is actually created here,

which granted makes all sorts of assumptions that probably aren't going to pan out in the long run. The Fought is actually projected for around half that number of innings. So I think the built-in projection is maybe around 75 innings or something like that for Brandon Fought. But again, nobody really knows, and that's not really the goal of the projections at the end of the day. So it's always a little bit tricky to figure out exactly what the playing time will look like. But the point is, the projection in terms of just raw performance level with whatever innings he gets is off the charts for a guy who has never pitched an inning in the big leagues. I've been looking at projections from Zips for a long time.

This is not something you see. You don't see guys, you know, who have never pitched an inning in the big leagues and weren't really like big name prospects coming up, you know, be projected for a 366 ERA and really good strikeout numbers, really low walk numbers. It really is a very, very rare thing. to see. Not only is it rare, but when you look at the, you know, other Zips projections, like kind of like what you were saying, there's a lot of names on here that might not even make the major league roster. So they do projections on everybody, but there's a good chance that

some of these guys will not be on the, on the roster next year, despite them having these projections. I mean, like Jordan Looplo is like on here, right? But yeah. Yeah, well, Caleb Smith, Zach Davies. Yeah. Right. Right. So I don't really know the thinking behind that, but I think Dan is just like, we don't know what's going to happen with these guys. Let's just keep them on here. Yeah. Well, if they're not, I imagine if they're not actually picked up by another team, they've just been DFAed that there's a chance still that they could find their way back to the Diamondbacks.

Right. Theoretically. Theoretically. But yeah, Brandon Fought's strikeout percentage, 24.6%. It's really good. Yeah. And like you said, a projected war of 2.8, which honestly is kind of, unbelievable, especially when you consider that looking at the projections for every other pitcher on their roster, only Zach Gallen appears to have a higher war than Brandon fought.

Isn't that crazy? Yeah, Merrill Kelly is, where's Merrill Kelly? Merrill Kelly is projected for 160 innings, maybe a little bit low, but they have him with 1.9 wins above replacement in a hundred and six. 16th inning. So Brandon Fott, according to Zips projections, is the Diamondback's second best starting pitch. Ahead of Merrill Kelly, ahead of Ray Jameson, Brian Nelson. Oh my God. Brandon Fott's your number two starter. It's wild. I also like the fact that he, that they have pitch comparisons on these Zips projections. Existing players that you can kind of compare their style to their yeah yeah it's pretty fun uh two names that zach gallon

are attached to here is jim palmer and john smoltz which that's fantastic but uh i like that brandon fought is compared to jeff weaver brett saber hagen and dan herron of all people i mean kind of makes sense right he do his success yeah it does make sense actually absolutely I mean, I don't remember exactly what Dan Heron threw. I don't think their arsenals are particularly, I don't remember Dary and really throwing a slider much, which is like Brandon Fott's best secondary pitch. But similar, I mean, similar like performance level, at least on paper, like a good number of strikeouts, neither of those guys walk many, walk many hitters.

And yeah, I mean, it sort of fits on paper. Now, of course, before we move on. on. We got to let you guys know that if you want to furnish your home or get your loved one a shocking gift, buy the gift of furniture for them. Why not? More furniture is your place to get that. And of course, right now, you, if you procrastinated like Jesse, you will save some money because they are having their holiday clearance sale, which you can get over at morefurniture.com. You can save up to 50% off. And Jesse, I need to get down on this. I need some new end tables. So I got to make sure before the holidays come and go.

And I also believe that morefurniture.com has the ability for you to pick up at one of their local stores if you purchase online. So make sure to keep an eye out for that and check out more furniture. Get yourself some new furniture this holiday season. Also shout out to our friends at Four Peaks for sponsoring our wonderful tea party event. And of course, you've got to make sure to make your way out to not only to the PHNX tea party at Dobson Ranch golf course, But make your way out to the Four Peaks, 8th Street Pub, the best place to try beer, to drink beer, and to eat chicken tenders.

Of course, the Four Peaks, the Four Peaks inaugural PHNX Tea Party, you can find the link in the description to reserve your spot right now. And of course, for Die Hards, check the Discord for your special link where you'll save 20% on this awesome event. And for all you that won't make it out, make sure to grab some four peaks either at the 8th Street Pub or wherever you get your beer at your local. grocery store. Make sure to be 21 and over only to enjoy their beer and enjoy responsibly. And of course, take the family out to enjoy those chicken tenders at the 4-Peach A Street Pub. Shout out to Jesse for still earning the nickname Tendies from Anthony Tautry, even though I've never seen this man eat chicken tenders anywhere except Four Peaks.

So I don't know. I don't know if that nickname's accurate, Jesse, but I still like it a lot. But another thing I like a lot, of course, is the zip projection. for the Debeck's offense for 2023. And of course, Dan Zimborski will be the first person to tell you to not come at him over these numbers. But he says incorrect projections are either caused by flaws in the physical reality of the universe or by skillful sabotage of a friend and former editor. So, you know, if you want to get mad at him on Twitter, you can do so.

But he's just going to reply with wonderful AI art. That's all he's going to do. but Brandon Fott isn't the only young player that's kind of taking the team by storm. Corby and Carroll, Jesse, is projected to have himself quite the 2023 season, according to Zip's projections. I think a lot of people looking at these numbers

might initially be underwhelmed. That's kind of the funny thing. So Zips says Corbyn Carroll. This is his triple slash line, 253 batting average, 341 on base, 428, slugging percentage, right? Like he, I mean, his slash line last year was 250, 330, 500, right? So maybe you're looking at these numbers, you know, like, that's it.

Like that's all, that's all you're going to figure in for Corby and Carroll next year. But what's crazy is that when you factor in his level of performance on defense and what he does on the base paths, his war projection is 3.9, which is the best on the entire Diamondbacks roster, actually even higher than Zach Gown. So they project Corbyn Carroll to be the best. most valuable player on the entire Diamondbacks roster in 2023. And again, sort of similar to fought is a guy who has 115 big league played appearances. And he's already projected as one of the best players on the team.

And Corbyn Carroll is another guy that Dan Zaborski has talked about a lot. It's like, yes, Zips absolutely loves him. Let's take a look at the top five on the Diamondbacks in war, Jesse. It's Corbin Carroll, Zach Gallen, then Kutelman. Marte than Christian Walker and then was it tied Brandon Brandon Fod is also Brandon Fod is technically tied with Christian Walker if you if you give him the full 150 innings. Right. Right. And then rounding out there at the end is Dalton Varsho, who is actually projected to hit more home runs next season than Christian Walker.

So do we really want to trade this guy, Jesse, to the Houston Astros for, for Patrick Cork? Is that really what we're going to do? Yeah, I don't know. Maybe if they throw in 10 million or something, maybe we think about it. We need nighttime Robert Murray to finish this trade. We need to know how it plays out. But yeah, Corby and Carol projected to play the entire season, projected to have 83 RBI, 129 hits, 16 home runs.

Like, these all sound very reasonable, too. I think that's the funny thing about it is I don't feel like his numbers are are, you know, so, like projections are so high that you question where the hell of this is going to come from. I do like him and Jake McCarthy both being projected to steal over 20 bases. And I think that's going to happen. Josh Rojas is also in the mix there with 18. But like you said, a lot of this, you know, of course, none of this is based on reality. It's just based on, you know, their performance in the past and where they think that it's actually going to get to.

So who knows if they actually live up to a lot of these numbers. It would be exciting if they did, though, because the Diamondbacks, even though they have nobody like raking, there's nobody expected to hit over 300. They have a lot of guys hitting in that range between 250 and 300, which to be honest, that sounds like a very successful Diamondbacks team. It sounds like where they found success last season. Everybody was pitching in. It was a combined group effort, but you weren't really getting too many players standing out

amongst the peers on their team. When they did it, they kind of did it together. It could be someone new every single night. And I mean, that's kind of what we're seeing here a bit from the projections. Yeah, I mean, the league as a whole last year hit 243. So if a guy sitting 250, 260, you're actually pretty much well above average at this point. But yeah, one name that really sticks out to me is Cotel Marte. I know you mentioned him briefly.

Catel Marte, according to Zips, is going to have a bounce back season. And again, we're looking at spreadsheets here, not like actual performances. But Zips has Cotel hitting 283, 352, 470 with a 3.1 war season overall, which is really good. Like, if the Diamondbacks got that from Cotel next year, that would be a huge development for the team. Because, I mean, frankly, with how Cotel looked last year, it's not that he wasn't like a useful major league player. his offense was was still average slightly above average he was still playable um but that extension that the diamond back sign with the tell didn't look so so great after after what we saw last year if he's able to bounce back like this that would be really big the other name that that sticks out to me

is like oh zips actually believes in this guy is uh is carson kelly uh carson kelly is projected to hit 241, 325, 409. Not off the table. Not crazy. Not crazy numbers by any stretch of the imagination. But if you got that from Carson Kelly after what he did last year, that would be, I mean, those are good numbers. Like for a catcher, if you have a catcher, you know, hit 241 with a 325 on base in a 409

slug, that's actually really good production out of a catching, out of your catching position. So maybe we get some odd year magic out of. Carson Kelly once again in 2023. Here's one thing that really stands out to me besides Dan just blasting Madison Bumgarner. He does say, though, that Madison Bumgarner has not been bad enough for his contract to be an outright disaster. However, he has been pretty lousy here in the desert. I like what he says here about Corbyn Carroll. Since Corbyn Carroll didn't lose his rookie qualifications for 2023, he's going to be one of the top few players on the Zip's top 100 prospect list.

next season. Zips rarely projects a rookie to play this well. I feel like I almost gave the exact same lecture about Julio Rodriguez last year. Yeah. That's a name that you want your rookie prospect to be compared to

is Julio Rodriguez, Jesse, because that's very exciting. I know there are different types of players, but Corbyn Carroll being that good is just something that all Arizona Diamondbacks should be fans should be excited about.

I also, I also want to say this about Cotel Marte. He has that war with having terrible defensive numbers projected. So like a lot of his war is based on how good offensively he's going to be. Yeah, going back to Carol real quick, like he's the favorite to win the NL rookie of the year award, at least in my mind. I know some people maybe prefer Francisco Alvarez,

the catcher from the Mets. He's also very, very talented and could get an extended look for them next year. But I think Corbyn Carroll is the favorite to win the rookie of the year award in much the same way that Julio Rodriguez was in the American League going into this year. I guess there were a few other names in that mix, but at least a lot of people at Julio Rodriguez at the top of that list. And Corbyn Carroll is going to go into next year with a similar level of expectation. Like he's really freaking good. And the fact that you could get a four war season from him, which is what Zips has projected with honestly like pretty conservative. offensive numbers is crazy.

If Corbyn Carroll actually comes out next year and has an 830 OPS like he did this past season and what was granted a very small sample size, he would be like a five or six win player. Like he would be he would be a superstar almost from the get go. That's how good Corbyn Carroll can be when you factor in the defense and the base running and everything that he gives you. Well, guess what, Jesse? my draft king's pick of the week didn't lose, by the way.

I did not curse the suns. And I know, well, that's why you're wearing that sun's hat right now that nobody can see on this audio only podcast. So it's a celebration today that we finally won some money. So make sure to download the draft king's sportsbook app, use promo code PhNX, place a $5 bet on any NFL team to win their game and get $150 in free bets if they do. That's only at the drafting sports book with code PHNX, minimum age and eligibility restrictions, apply see show notes for details jesse i'm i'm riding high i'm excited we we got the sons to win we we didn't curse them this time starting to believe that it's not my fault that these teams lose when i bet on them so i'm feeling good about myself let's go it was like a it's like a borderline g league

lineup last night i mean it's like their entire roster shut up but guess what that announcement hadn't been made when i picked that made that pick yes fair it's a good bet it's a good All right. Thank you. Thank you. Of course, you make some good bets over at the Drafking Sportsbook app, win yourself some money. The biggest thing I want you guys to look out for is the promos that you have to opt in for. Last night, they had a promo. I think it was a plus 100 value for Christian McCaffrey scoring in any time touchdown, which is normally like minus a thousand because that's all that guy does is score touchdown. So keep an eye out for those promos because as my friends will say, you're leaving free money on the table when you don't take up draft.

King's Sportsbook on those offers. And the Arizona Diamondbacks are not leaving any free money on the table. That's for sure because they're not really given too much of it out. But make sure to stay tuned right here. We still think, as Mike Hazen said, he has some bullets left in the gun. And I doubt that Scott McGuff was really one of those bullets. But who knows what's going to happen? And it's probably going to be via trade if it does.

So keep your eyes peeled for that. In the meantime, you can follow us on Twitter. We will keep you updated on all of the things going on in the Arizona Diamondbacks. world. I'm at cap underscore caveman with a k. Jesse is at Jesse and Friedman. Our show is at PHNX underscore Dbacks, but of course all roads lead to at pHNX underscore sports on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. We thank you guys again for joining us. Of course, on behalf of Jesse myself, we always appreciate your time. And remember kids, baseball is

fun, but it's so much more fun when Zips projects your team to be very good next season.