Rates & Barrels - Acuña Injury Watch, March Movers, Zack Wheeler Extension & Matt Chapman to the Giants

Episode Date: March 4, 2024

Eno and DVR discuss a busy weekend of news including further examination of Ronald Acuña Jr.'s surgically-repaired knee, shoulder fatigue for Kevin Gausman, Zack Wheeler's extension with the Phillies, Matt Chapman's three-year deal with the Giants, a pair of big March movers in recent drafts, and the increasingly complicated playing time situations in Baltimore and Cincinnati.  Rundown 1:31 More Knee Trouble for Ronald Acuña Jr.? 7:36 Chris Sale's Rapidly-Rising ADP 11:00 Kevin Gausman Slowed by Shoulder Fatigue 12:57 Zack Wheeler Signs Three-Year Extension w/Phillies 16:07 Matt Chapman Goes to the Giants 23:43 Fallout & Secondary Benefits to Chapman's Arrival in San Francisco 30:57 Wyatt Langford is Flying Up Draft Boards 37:05 Colt Keith v. Jordan Westburg? 38:44 Building a Bench: Orioles Edition 44:45 Jordan Hicks v. A.J. Puk v. Reynaldo López 51:04 Building a Bench: Reds Edition 58:57 How Much Do We Pay Attention to First- and Second-Half Splits? Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Join us on Fridays at 1p ET/10a PT for our new livestream episodes w/Trevor May! https://www.youtube.com/c/ratesbarrels Subscribe to The Athletic for just $2/month for the first year: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels, it's Monday, March 4th, Derek Van Riper here with Spring Training Eno. If you're watching us on YouTube, you can see Eno has a completely different backdrop that is old Scottsdale Stadium, the current spring training home of the Giants. Looks like some BP taking place there. Very nice. And you're being very resourceful, literally

using a barrel to get the show done today. I have this thing set up on a trash can in a room that I'm not sure I'm allowed to use. This show could be 12 minutes long, could be a full hour. We really don't know. Bob Euchre could come in this door and kick me out with probably some nice cuss words attached to it.

There's also a chance he'd just sit down and start riffing with you and it'd be the best show ever. You on? This is live? Oh, how's it going start talking about brats yeah all sorts of good stuff but tons to cover we had injury news this weekend we have signings we have extensions we have march movers we're going to try and build some benches we're going to try and take mailbag questions all this of course time permitting i will say real quick jump in the Discord if you haven't done so already. The link to join that is in the show description. Now, we begin

today's show with the news about Ronald Acuna Jr. He had an MRI on his knee over the weekend. That showed inflammation, but he's headed to Los Angeles. Could be visiting with Dr. Neil Eletrosh right now. Dr. Elitrosh is the doctor who performed the reconstructive surgery on Acuna's knee back in July of 2021. This all kind of followed him getting scratched from the lineup from a game on Friday. Alex Anthopoulos was on MLB Network Radio on Sunday, I believe, and he made a comment suggesting they still think Acuna will be ready for opening day. So we're just kind of in the holding pattern right now. And I keep thinking about this more from the perspective of we're going to get some kind of update and he's probably going to miss a

little bit of time at a minimum, just because you'd be careful with Acuna. Why wouldn't you? But his projection is so much better than everyone else. How much time does Acuna have to be projected to miss before he really falls out of that 1-1 position on most draft boards? Well, I think the risk right now is that everyone's thinking about the ACL tear and would it be a tear or whatever, but no one's saying that it's a tear. So I think the risk right now is on the level of weeks out of the full season. So he's still my number one pick. If you look at projections, like you said, he's like $10 north of everybody.

So what, is he only $5 north of everybody right now? Like I'm still in as the first pick. I'm still in on spending $40, $50, $45 at least on him in auctions. Like I'm still all in because I think this is one of those, let's just make sure it's nothing worse. What? Like you still got a chance, 15, 20% chance that it is something worse, but no one's used any words other than inflammation.

So I still think you got think you gotta i think you gotta go for it and take him i i'm you know i've had a slightly different uh i don't know if people have noticed this but i've had a slightly different um interaction with risk this draft season and uh part of it it was because i sat down with a friend of mine who works for who's worked for amazon and google and some of these places and um we were talking about risk and risk in baseball and and we were talking about contracts and and you know in back of my head thinking of fantasy and he was saying that you know the best and brightest minds that he met at these at those corporations all embraced risk and i was thinking about it also from like a portfolio standpoint like we have all these teams

why not embrace risk differently on each of your teams if you are running more than one team then have a slightly different way of thinking about it every time because each of those are stocks in a portfolio. And if you are young enough or you have enough teams, if you're young enough and your retirement package has, you should want some risk in there. You don't want it to all be boring vanilla. You want some that could take off. And if you have 15 teams, why not have three or four that are like, we've joked about YOLO. I've been doing a big yo-yo recently where I've been taking high upside and high floor, sort of alternating.

So I think that on some level we should embrace risk. In this case, the outcome is the very best player in fantasy baseball, bar none, very obviously. Yeah, and I think there have been some interesting posts recently about the players that the fantasy market likes more than the projections. And all of that, it tends to be risk-driven. It's buying into growth years. It's buying into players coming off of injuries. into growth years. It's buying into players coming off of injuries. It's those kinds of mindsets that tend to be the areas where we as humans can do a little better than the projections

because there's more information that simply can't be accounted for in a projection that we with our brains can try and account for. So I think that's a great point. I think I'm also on that side that's embraced risk for a long time, kind of taking these gambles and hoping that by balancing it out with the necessary bland, safe players, you can offset that risk within your roster and reduce the number of holes you have to fill later in case you're wrong. You might be wrong about some things, but it's okay to be wrong about some things. You can be very conservative in how you build a roster and still be wrong about things. You're going to have to make in-season pickups and make in-season moves in every league to be successful. So you're not going to solve it all on draft day. That's a big part of it is realizing how much it's, you know, I took last year a team that was, you know, 750th out of 780 in the main event and just by the virtue of working hard through

the season we we cashed out in that league and and finished in the top three so i know how much it's is done i know that the the decreasing percentages that these players are on your roster so why take a boring guy when you get to the place where oh this guy's not going to make it to the end of the season on my roster why take a boring guy there you know like it doesn't make as much sense anymore um and uh yeah i think just generally uh you know you have to you have to kind of pair risk with you know because you can get in trouble with all the sort of biases that we have psychologically as human beings where you have recency bias one of those lists shows that all the bounce back pitchers um are liked more by projections than by humans and that's like that's kind of a duh um but uh maybe with stuff plus we can identify the ones that will

truly bounce back and the ones you know that look like they're in trouble but you should be shopping from each of those groups you should be shopping from last year's disappointments that the projections like you should be shopping from the players that the market likes more than the projections because shopping from the injury risk ones. Yeah. Like, you know, why is sales ADP, you know, gone up like 50 points in the last two weeks because we can see with our eyes that he looks healthy. Now we can't forget that he's been healthy, not been healthy a lot, but it's another, he's a, he's a,

he's got the case for like a Tyler glass now in the thing where he might give you 130, 140, uh, uh, innings, but, uh, there might be really good ones. We're playing that game of cliffhangers. If you're not a fan of the prices, right. It's where the yodeling man goes up the mountain, and as long as you don't miss by too much, he stays on the mountain and you win prizes.

If you go way too far over, he falls over. I've not thought about that game in a while. I think about that game every single day of my life. Sales ADP is getting close to the top of the mountain, though, where even if you liked him at the beginning, you're looking at it and saying, look, this is a guy that if I was drafting in November, I was getting him at pick one 80.

If I was drafting in February, he's getting a pick one 40. Now, if I'm drafting in the first week of March, he's going at pick 100. Okay. So if he goes any higher, he falls off the mountain for me.

And I just say, great. I like Chris sale. Atlanta likes Chris sale. I don't like Chris sale at that increased sort of price. So yeah, top 100 overall ADP for sale here in these first four days of March. Pretty big shift because not a lot has changed except for the fact that we see him out there healthy right now.

That's a big deal for us as far as how we analyze players. One thing I would say is that there is a little bit of change. I ran, we don't have everybody's stack cast numbers but the guys that we do have stack cast numbers for i ran them this season against last season to see who was up and i wanted to highlight just guys who are up a tick in velo and also an inch of ride um and that grouping of starting pitchers is pretty interesting jack flaherlaherty has taken his fastball from kind of dead zone movement up into a true four-seam territory. It's not quite plus or great, but it's better.

It's now like sort of 17, 18 IVB. We talk about 18 plus being really good. So he's throwing 17s up there right now and he's sitting 94 and a half 95. um so we don't know what that's going to look like when he has to go five innings but Jack Flaherty's fastball looks good Chris sale has uh taken his IVB up to we're talking 18s 19s and 20s like he looks really good plus he got a tick of velo roenzi contraris has shown more ride and more velo but we've seen in the past that he has real hard trouble maintaining that through the season so he may still be headed towards being a reliever just to finish the list nester cortez and sunny gray uh have also added both

ride and uh velo in significant portions so uh those are guys that i've got my eyes on as maybe moving a little bit my my updated rankings that are going tomorrow um that are more interesting to me because they're doing uh good things with their fastball. Yeah, nice to see that. Nestor Cortez, a nice person to have on that list in the sense that he was hurt so much last year. To see some improvement in the underlying stuff gives you, to me, an indication that he's pretty healthy at this point in the spring. So other injury news to get to.

Kevin Gossman battling shoulder fatigue right now. He had an MRI as well. No structural damage. That's good. Had a planned bullpen for Monday that was scrapped. Gossman hasn't pitched in a grapefruit league game yet though, so there are some questions about his availability for opening day that are starting to surface.

I dropped him. You did move him down. How far did he fall? I just put him behind Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who looked great, and behind Luis Castillo, who looked good and then just also is kind of a horse and has a wider arsenal, frankly. Kevin Gossman can come out of this and be healthy but also lose a half tick or lose a tick.

I mean, that's normal aging for a person of his age and his fastball. I think if he loses a tick, it's a big deal for him because a two pitch pitcher. So I've already been nervous about his projections as they were. You know, my personal projections, you know, have not supported him necessarily as a as a top four, top five type guy. You know, because even before this news, we had sort of a three eight ERA projection with using stuff. Plus, so, you know, I've also got to see health grade on him. The the only other, you know, worse in the top 10 is, I don't believe Cole's C, so I'm going to put that away.

But Zach Wheeler's F, which also seems a little weird, given how good he's looked recently. But those are the two that, like, make me a little bit nervous, more nervous than Kirby I have after Wheeler. Maybe Kirby I should have ahead of Wheeler and just be like, screw it, yes, I have him as the fourth best pitcher in baseball. But we have news also about Wheeler in terms of getting that extension. Three years, $126 million.

So if the Phillies really thought this was a health-grade F situation... But it's only three. Yeah, but he's old. Yeah. He's old, and it's over $40 million per average AAV. That's a lot of money. If you really had an F health-grade, would they give him $126 million over three years? I mean, look, teams make mistakes sometimes.

They're not perfect, but I feel like you wouldn't give a guy at Wheeler's age. Do you remember Glasnow's extension? Yeah. What was it? Four for 110. Less money, and he's younger. The thing is, teams are starting to spend more on frontline pitching at an advanced age. If you make it to your late 30s, mid to late

30s, and you're pitching as a top five, top 10 sort of starter, you can still get paid. Yeah, Verlander Scherzer showed us that. There's a world where Tyler Glass now stays relatively healthy over the life of his extension with the Dodgers, and he hits free agency again and gets 45 or 50 million per, because that's what pitchers are going to get at that time if they're frontline guys so uh anyway i didn't drop him far you you kind of don't want to overreact uh but you know shoulder anything with the word shoulder in it for a pitcher makes me nervous and fatigue isn't great and then on top of that just there's like the brass you know he's gotta he got to get ready for the regular season.

And if he's not even throwing now, when does he throw? When does he get two innings? When does he get four innings? Is he not going to be ready for the beginning of the season? Bowden Francis time. People were asking in Discord about him. Yeah,

opportunity is knocking. I think Yariel Rodriguez is banged up. Ricky Tiedemann's a little bit behind right now for the Jays. So there is an opportunity in the back of that rotation anyway. And if Gossman were to miss time, it would be two spots. Did Manoa get an MRI too? Yeah, Manoa didn't feel good after his last outing. It's starting to pile up pretty quickly on the Jays.

They're going to have to stretch Trevor Richards back out again. The Gossman dip, though. Dropping him a couple spots in the ranking seems appropriate, given that it's an arm injury for a pitcher. The Acuna situation, I would point back to, again, the gap between Acuna and the field. Yes, that gap shrinks as a result of what we know right now, but he's still the best player in the pool.

There was so little to separate Gossman from Yamamoto or Castillo or Kirby or the other guys in his tier. That's why it's easier to just bump a few guys ahead of him. It's not that we're saying the sky is falling. It's just adjusting relative to the other guys who were pennies, maybe a different in value, depending on how you calculated it. That's what it comes down to the wheeler extension to me is really interesting because we see a lot of guys that could get that one more bite at the apple in free agency taking an extension to stay put and just not going back into the market which hurts you if you're one of those teams that was out there thinking you would get an ace in the offseason on a deal like this well we just heard uh scott boris speak here we had the matt chapman

press conference and scott boris was speaking about the state of the industry. It was pretty funny because I asked him, this is what I asked him. I said, have you seen over the course of your career, a convergence in how players are valued and the offers that you've gotten? And his answer had nothing to do with that. It's just like nothing. He did not address it at all. Instead, he started talking about how you have nine teams trying to cut 30 to $60 million out of their payroll in the face of skyrocketing profits around the league.

And I was like, you asked a good question and he used it as a speed bump during a stump speech. Oh, he just, yeah, exactly. It was the politician moment. It's like, and this is, I'm going to get to talk about what I want to talk about. He even like looked at me funny for a second. I was like, uh, okay, well, I'm not getting the right answer here. I'm not going to tell you what kinds of offers my clients are getting.

Right. Yeah. I mean, that's, that's partially probably why he wouldn't answer it but um it does relate back i think to maybe some of these high value deals that people are taking is that maybe boris and his clients see the current situation is maybe a little bit one of instability and chaos and maybe short-term chaos that maybe the sport will come out of this group of this time period healthier with regards to what its relationship is to its consumers in terms of streaming in terms of cable you know what are we going to do post valleys if that's happening you know? What's the streaming solution to this?

Maybe they're saying, hey, we'll just take high AV short-term. Every player is a little bit different. Chapman had the finger injury, and like Snell, people have durability concerns. But if you're seeing some high-value Cody Bellinger contracts, stuff like that, A, it's the player betting on themselves and B, maybe it's them saying, hey, maybe in two or three more years, everything will be a little bit healthier

and we'll get a better deal. The other part of all this though, I mean, you and I talk enough about projections and I think many of our listeners understand enough about how your most recent season will have the heaviest weight in your projection. If you're Matt Chapman, if you're anybody who had a relative down year,

this is an except Bellinger had a great year. So Bellinger had the problem of the previous two seasons dragging down projections for him and making things confusing. Matt Chapman had this really strange season with the blue Jays. We've talked about it a few times where he was still hitting the ball hard, but he wasn't pulling his barrels. He wasn't taking advantage of the hard contact we have a visual for this it's pretty pretty obvious when you look at it visually yeah you see the dots if you're watching on youtube i mean you see look at where the homers were left left center little bit to center but

mostly just pull half of the field right and they're scattered all over the place in 2023 but when you look at barrel rates, look at hard hit rates, look at Chapman and say, well, he should bounce back. And it's not really that simple because I think you could reasonably look at the chart from 23. You could watch him. If you could evaluate him and say, he lost some bat speed. He still hits the ball hard, but he's a little late. Like that's the problem. But I don't think, how could he have the same barrel rates and the same max EV if he lost bat speed? That still hits the ball hard, but he's a little late. That's the problem. But I don't think, how could he have the same barrel rates and the same max EV if he lost bat speed?

That's sort of, that's where I push back a little bit. I was thinking what you're saying, yeah. Right, like my brain looks at it and says, no, he's still hitting the ball hard. If you hit the ball hard, you didn't lose bat speed, but if you're letting it travel, are you a little late? Yes, that's exactly it. So you've lost some, but not a lot.

Yeah, so I asked him about this in the press conference today. In fact, I joked about it with the PR guy on the way in being like, do you think I can ask about pulled barrel rates in this press conference? He's like, oh, I don't know. But I found a way to ask him where he was talking about his finger. So Matt Chapman said he had a sprained middle finger for, you know, and it wasn't one of those things where like you need surgery or whatever. It's just one of those things where you don't feel great most of the year, you know? And so I jumped

in and I was like, did that sprain finger affect you? You still hit the ball really hard. Did it affect you when it came to pulling your barrels more, pulling, pulling more? And he kind of suggested it did. What he said was just in terms of barrel control, he like just didn't have that last bit of barrel control and one finger being off. You know what that reminds me of is sort of command, right? Yeah. He's like a,

he's like a pitcher who had a year where he still hit the VLO, like almost like a Rodon or something. He was still hitting the, the 95s or whatever, but he just couldn't command it, you know? And that's sort of, that's what, 95s or whatever, but he just couldn't command it. That was the answer that Chapman gave, that he just didn't have that last bit of barrel control.

It feeds right into what I'm seeing and what I see in the numbers. It was catnip to me, but it could sound like excuses to other people. The way this deal is structured, it's three for 54, but there's an opt-out after each of the first two seasons. He's going to get $20 million this year, then it goes down to $18, then it goes down to $16 if he stays with the Giants

the whole time. I'm buying in on Chapman. My assertion the entire time has been that you don't hit the ball that hard if you lost something. There had to be more of something else going on. Injury fully satisfies my need for an explanation. So it makes me feel good as someone that's looked at Chapman consistently

and said, way undervalued right now. Yeah, batting average problems, sure, those are always going to be there, but the power should still be more like upper 20s home run power. His defense keeps him on the field a lot. He's a max volume player. He's hit in bad parks before. Yes, he's dealt with Oakland for most of his career. And then he had to deal with the new dimensions at Rogers Center last year.

So I'm not really worried about Oracle for him. I think the playing time is really stable. He'll probably move up a little now that we know where he's playing. I think there's this weird fear about guys that aren't on a team, that they're not going to find a team. Players this good will find a team. Blake Snell is going to find a team too. Don't worry about Blake Snell not having a team.

If you're worried about which park he lands in, which defense is behind him, totally valid. You're worried about him not finding a team. There are parks that inflate or deflate walk rates. I mean, that'd be an interesting one to look up when he's signing. Park factors. Yeah, we could look at that. So as far as Chapman goes, the would you rather, and this was a real one that I actually had going into the weekend at TGFBI. I think it's a pretty simple one. It's Matt Chapman versus Eugenio Suarez. Who do you trust more now that you know

where both of these guys are going to be playing in 2024. Yeah, my big answer was age is a pretty big factor here. Because what we're looking at are two guys that had kind of down seasons. But if I have this right, I believe Eugenio is 35. Suarez is only 32. He'll turn 33 in July. 32 and Chapman's 30. Yeah, two-year difference. Two-year difference.

I mean, I think that's enough sometimes when you're when you're you're splitting the hairs you know it's like both these guys hit the ball hard uh both these guys have strikeout issues both these guys probably have a hole somewhere in the zone that people have been picking away i mean chapman's not great high in the zone uh but both both of them can really spank it if it's in their happy zone. So, you know, I'd rather take the guy who's two years younger. I'm going to let that one cruise right by. From a playing time perspective, who loses with Chapman's arrival? That's a max volume player.

J.D. Davis seems like an obvious answer, right? The guy that was the third baseman, but it makes sense. Even though J.D. Davis was better defensively last year, he still wasn't good. This is a huge upgrade for the pitching staff as a whole to have Chapman there instead. Davis kind of falls now into this first base DH rotation where Lamont Wade Jr. is a lefty. You got Jorge Soler who's going to DH a lot.

He's another righty. I don't think you want to throw J.D. Davis back out in the outfield again. So this looks like a pretty big hit to his playing time in particular. Is there anybody else you see sort of losing as a result of things getting more crowded? It's actually, there's a little sad story here behind this, is that Matt Chapman forced J.D. Davis off third base in college too, because they went to college together. Oh, really?

Yeah. And today someone asked about it, if they had an awkward conversation and chapman was like hey man we're teammates we both want to win like it is it's a little weird but we've known each other since eight we're 18 years old so we're like we're cool with each other you know but it would be interesting to kind of be someone who knew this kid since he was 18 and be like, oh, my God, not a freaking gen. What the? So, yeah, J.D. Davis probably kicked a trash can at some point. You know, they've been kicking around this idea of the Mariners.

I just don't know what kind of trade value Davis has. I believe it's only one more year of control. Let me see here. Team control. He's a free agent at 2020-25. He's projected, if you gave him full playing time, to be like a two-win player maybe. That's what he was last year.

So you're talking about kind of a league average right-handed, maybe third baseman it's i don't think it's going to have that much value on the open market like what would and and the need i think in san francisco pretty obviously is someone who can start even if it's for just a little bit you know but i don't think the teams are really giving up starters so like could you trade him for austin both i I think Austin Voth signed a one-year, $1 million contract. I don't even know if he's eligible to be traded. Projection-wise, you wouldn't do that trade, but need-wise, would you?

What is somebody going to give you for one year of a league average guy? I think if you're the Giants, just leave it alone because you have three lefties that you're relying on that don't necessarily need to play against same-handed pitching between Wade, Conforto, and Jastrzemski. So if you want to take Soler and play him in the outfield when you sit Conforto and play Soler every day, then J.D. Davis DHs in those spots and occasionally fills in Elfra.

And Flores can in first over Wade. It's a big minus though on his playing time. It is, but Chapman did say there's A's and B's for him on his team. He can be helpful on his team. I do think that's probably how the team's going to look at it because I don't think he's going to bring them back up for the starter.

I think the way this bench gets built, this is an easy bench to build right now. Tom Murphy looks like he's the backup catcher. Austin Slater looks like the extra outfielder. Wilmer Flores is there as an extra. Austin Slater. Yep, he'll platoon with Yaz probably. So you got Murphy, Slater, J.D. Davis now on the bench, and Wilmer Flores.

Those are your four guys. And your backup shortstop plays second base. Tyro Estrada just moves over and someone else plays second. Some rumblings that Nick Ahmed is going to take that job and they're going to put Marco Luciano in the minors. I disagree with it, frankly. As I've gotten older, I've been more comfortable just being like, this is a feeling.

It's not necessarily. But I do think even the stats probably back me up. Like if you're looking at a projection for Luciano versus Nick Ahmed, it's probably going to be Luciano, you know. And I just personally watching him, I think his hands are fine. I think he's fine left or right. He throws some balls away. But I just think that would be –

other people were saying it would be best for him as a year in AAA because he hasn't had a lot of time in the minors. And I guess I can see that. But do you remember when Lindor like was like in the minors and like his numbers were only okay. And then they finally brought him up and he was better. And like people asked him, he's like, oh yeah, because I'm in the big leagues now. You don't want to suggest that he's not going to focus as much in AAA,

but he's got to taste the big leagues. If you send him back down to AAA, it feels like a demotion now because he played in the big leagues last year. So I say just give him the frigging job. And Ahmed can be backup. Is he on our bench? Not yet. If he makes the roster, he'd be on, and then someone Ahmed can be backup. Is he on our bench? Not yet. If he makes the roster, he'd be on and then someone else can fall off. None of those names

we mentioned out of Murphy, Davis, Flores, or Slater have options left. You do have to cut someone or send someone else down or trade somebody if you're going to go a different route. The other question I have here, does the addition of Chapman take some of the pressure defensively off of Luciano compared to having

Davis there, especially he put a better third baseman next to Marco Luciano, his own defensive limitations would seemingly be reduced, right? So now that you've got a better option at third, maybe that softens the blow a little bit. And the top six in this lineup is by roster resource. It's Jungho Lee, Tyro Estrada, Wade, Solaire, Conforto, Chapman. Pretty good top six. You're not putting a lot of pressure on Luciano's bat right now either because he got a little bit better with your offense by adding Chapman. That's 100% where we got to in this argument.

And part of it, the other side of the argument was, I'll out him, it was Andrew Baggerly and I talking about what we should do. Spring training, we're in there talking about it. And his point was, get Nick Ahmed in there, get the really good glove, pick everything, and there's no need for him to have a great bat if you've lengthened the lineup as you have. So, and I was like, no, just put Luciano down there. You're not depending on the hint for

anything anything he does is bonus you know uh but there i am on a little bit of a divide where i think more of luciano defensively than a lot of pundits so um i think that's where the disagreement is if you think that luciano can be a credible starting shortstop, I think you just stick him there all year. I'm not saying that he's going to necessarily be a 15-year shortstop. I don't think of him that well. But during his athletic peak, five to seven years, I think he can do it. At least give it a shot temporarily

because now you've got Matt Chapman playing third base. So nice to see him find a landing spot. Definitely think he gets a slight bump up board, pick 250, probably is where you're going to have to take Chapman. That's totally reasonable for someone who's going to play as much as he does. Now with that pinky injury in my back pocket, now I've got extra reason for wanting Matt Chapman in as many leagues as possible for cheap power. You mentioned Marco Luciano not spending a lot of time in the minors, and I got Wyatt Langford on the rundown today because much like Chris Sale, he's been a big

mover over the weekend. He's cruising up draft boards. Wyatt Langford went with a min pick of 64 in a draft over the weekend. He's now going at 105 as far as his NFBC ADP over the last four days. Just to compare that to another highly regarded top prospect, Jackson Churio is going at 127. The min is 109. So Langford is moving up and moving up fast. So how do you feel about Langford as somebody who's played all of 44 games in the minor leagues, it was great at every single stop, but that's a really limited track record for someone who should have a pretty prominent role for the Rangers

once he is up, be that opening day or not long after. There are three or four prospects that I think are 75% plus and that's being a little bit conservative maybe 80-90% plus to make their opening day roster I think number one for me on that list is like Colt Keith

maybe Jackson Shurio because I just think that the financial incentives the way that their contracts are set up maybe Jackson Shurio, because I just think that the financial incentives, the way that their contracts are set up, their teams are really incentivized just to put to plan. You got them for this many years. You signed them. There's no, you want to put them out there.

You know, they play a position where you need somebody. Yeah. Like you're a team that's sort of ready to kind of put this kind of player on the field. So those guys, I thought Luciano was in that group. I'm going to drop Luciano's percentage today because of that argument down to maybe we're out 70%. I think that Langford is probably in that group too, although he doesn't have the contract deal. There still is the chance that Rangers could get a rookie of the year and then get a pick out of it um and in terms of their off season they didn't spend a lot in the off season maybe this could be their way of spending it's like oh maybe we lose one extra year of eligibility

or maybe it gets expensive quicker but you know we had an offseason where we didn't do much. Let's just throw a white Langford out there. And in terms of what the depth chart looks like, I think that you're not really losing much to put Langford out there. You might DH Adelius Garcia sometimes. You could just kind of run through who you DH. And I guess Liotis Tavares could have some risk. Do you think that Liotis Tavares would lose playing time if Lankford played?

Not necessarily, just because they didn't really do much to block DH. They can float it. They can rotate based on who they like from a hitting perspective. I mean, I think it's their bench is pretty easy to break down to. Travis Jankowski is a kind of all glove, speedy outfielder. Josh Smith, infield outfield, nice, versatile utility guy. Andrew Kisner is the new backup catcher behind Jonah Heim. And then Ezekiel Duran is the plays everywhere and is the first guy, like the super sub. That's a pretty clear bench, and that's with roster resource throwing Langford in as the DH, even though he'll move around and mix and match with everybody else.

That's very plausible to me. I would say there's room for Langford, room for Tavares, and room for one more upgrade on the bench. They could get one more good player and not even threaten the playing time of the young guys. That's my grouping of prospects that I

think are worth a little bit more investment than just endgame, shot in the darks. Those are the guys that I think may start opening day on their rosters thinking about your your risk comments a little earlier in the show are you comfortable taking a shot on wyatt langford if let's say it's pick 75 or so because that's probably where you're gonna have to say okay it's now or never given how much people are bumping them up where you are in the draft order could matter of course too are you buying in at the now increased price on langford i have not done it yet

and i this is speaking from a guy who did uh take um jack centurio but I was able to take Jackson Churio. Let's see here. Where did I take him? I took him in the 10th round, so at pick 160. I'm just way more comfortable down there taking my shot because whatever percentage it is, it's not 100%. I think for me, I'm okay at thinking about it in a shallow league.

Shallow to me is 12 teams or less. I would pay the increased price on Langford. I'm probably not doing it in a 15, and I'm probably not doing it in the highest of stakes leagues that I play in either, because that's where the cost versus the risk reward is not there. But if you made it a would you rather, if you said who would you rather have at the same price between Wyatt Langford and O'Neal Cruz,

I believe more in Wyatt Langford being a safer floor player than O'Neal Cruz. I just think Langford is one of those dudes that's going to help in every single category without that liability and batting average that comes from the struggles O'Neal Cruz. I just think Lankford is one of those dudes that's going to help in every single category without that liability and batting average that comes from the struggles O'Neal Cruz has had against lefties, the extreme struggles that O'Neal Cruz has had so far against lefties. So there's a case for it for sure. But I think my risk tolerance with a player like this at that price changes a lot based on the depth of the league. Yeah, 100%. All right.

Wyatt Langford flying up draft boards. We got a few other would-you-rathers that I got teed up here because... Would-you-rather. Wonderful. Loved it. For 2024 only, you just mentioned Colt Keith and the confidence you have that he's a big part of the Tigers' plan. I'm with you.

He signed the extension. He's third base eligible now. He's going to play second base, so he's going to be of the Tigers' plan. I'm with you. He signed the extension. He's third base eligible now. He's going to play second base, so he's going to be just like Jordan Westberg, second and third base eligible about a week or so into the season. Who would you rather have for this season, Keith or Westberg, if you could only get one onto your roster? I'm going to go with Keith. I think that the playing time situation is lining up for more all- all the time playing time westberger already did some

bouncing around playing time wise ramon urias is um would if ramon urias is on the tigers i wouldn't think of him too much of a threat to colt keith but ramon urias on the orioles who are probably going to try and squeeze every last drop out of every game and try to win as many games as possible, which includes probably platooning and playing around with the lineup. I could just see Colt Keith being a little bit of a set it and forget it guy for the Tigers who want to establish who their core is going forward. I trust Keith's playing time more. I think Westberg's speed gives him a little more categorical juice. He's a nice consolation prize, but I think if your priority is getting someone, maybe you're

trying to get one of Chapman or Suarez and you miss, I actually kind of prefer Keith as the fallback option if I'm desperate for playing time. Westberg's totally fine where he's going if you can wait a little bit. If you can wait a few weeks, see how things materialize. I think we've been getting a few requests for an Orioles build a bench in greater detail. I know we just had our Orioles preview. The roster resource version of their bench is hilarious. I think they would even say, like,

this isn't really what their bench is going to look like. This is just what it is right now. James McCann is the backup catcher. Ramon Arias is one of the backup infielders. Jorge Mateo is the backup shortstop, but also can play in the outfield. And then Nick Maton is there right now. And of those guys, McCann's pretty safe as Adley Rudgeman's backup. Doesn't really matter who that spot goes to, but he's the guy.

None of Urias, Mateo, or Nick Maton have options left. So if they're going to bring younger guys up to begin the season, like Colton Couser is having a great spring. Stupidest thing about spring training and who, who wins, who wins jobs coming out of spring training is often has to do with options. Luke really made the raise last year, mostly because he was out of options.

Played well, probably earned a job with the Mariners as a result of what he did last year, too. But yeah, the out of options thing is huge right now. So the question would come back to Colton Couser's going off. And by the way, Roster Resource does have both Westberg and Holiday as starters at second and third with Gunnar Henderson at short, which is in line with what the Orioles have really been doing for the most part this spring and the comments they've made about this roster. Yeah, that's what they're doing. Gunner at short, Holiday at second, Westbrook at third

as kind of their regular configuration for those guys. But that still leaves Heston Kerstad and Colton Couser and eventually Kobe Mayo all currently on the outside. I don't look at this team and think yeah you've you've got the sports car starting lineup but you've got the beater on the bench like that's not really the way they're built the organizational depth they built up is there a downside to bringing more of those young guys up there is i mean frankly there is there is a downside and it it actually i don't think it has to do so much with the development of the players because Colton Couser is here playing against major leaguers

and doing fine. I think it has to do with lost resources. So if you think Ramon Urias is worth anything, you don't want to lose him. If you think Jorge Mateo is worth anything, you don't want to lose him. And so I think the most likely way that Couser, Kerstad, and Mayo get playing time is injury.

They will be up this year as injury replacements. And I think they may even go back down once everyone's healthy. Because again, I don't think Mateo and Urias are these amazing things, but the option is just never having them again. Just releasing them. And teams try not to do that. Or trading for a non-prospect prospect. Someone that's far, far away.

For Ramon Urias or Jorge Mateo. I guess you could get a 17-year-old reliever arm, something. I think of the three, Urias is the one they would like the most. His defense is good. He takes good at bats. Just seems to be the best all-around player of the three. I don't think Nick Maton's on

this roster. I think he's the guy that gets cut. And then Mateo's more of the are they going to trade him? Does someone else want him for shortstop depth? They're going to keep one of those three guys. You think they're only going to keep one of Mateo, Urias, and Maton

going into the season? By the end of the season. Oh, okay, by the end of the season. I don't think Maton makes the roster. I think he's just the guy right now. If Maton doesn't make the roster, our bench is McCann, Mateo, Urias, and what? And maybe somebody Kerstad or Kouser.

I think it's maybe Kouser. Kouser's hitting the ball really hard this spring. Three homers already. Looks like a different player. But I think if you bring Kouser up, compared to the beater car bench that I described, you do have more pressure on all your starters. Maybe that's good.

But the guys that I think have the most pressure on them, in some order, Ryan O'Hearn, who was better than anybody expected last year. I was just staring at him. Austin Hayes to an extent and Ryan Mountcastle. Those are the three that for the long-term perspective, they'd be the guys most likely to get replaced or at least lose some of their time. And with Mountcastle and Hayes, those two guys are righties. So they could be more in danger of losing big side platoon playing time if there's a lefty that they feel is ready.

Yeah, O'Hearn's projected to be 5% better than league average, which is kind of where, it's kind of average for first baseman. So he's kind of average-ish. They only have him, in terms of losing years of team control, they have a club option on him.

So if they decide sometime this year that he's not that good, then they're not going to exercise the club option. And so that seems like a fairly soft spot on the roster, I agree with you. All right, so we have a pretty good sense of what the benches look like, what it looks like today,

what it might look like on opening day, and how it could change between now and the end of the season. I like that you're identifying a little bit of opportunity for Kouser here. Because the nice thing about having Mateo and Urias in your grouping is you basically cover every position. Yeah, they have a lot of options with what they can do with any combination of players they keep. They just

don't have a lot of minor league options on the older guys, and that's something that might push some players off the roster over the course of the year. I just don't see how Nick Maton sticks around with the Orioles. Maybe they can sneak him through on waivers and keep him at AAA or something, but he seems like a guy that somebody else always wants to stash.

Or they just use the beginning of season to put Kha'Zix and Kersad back down and Meton starts the season with them. Could. Could do it. The young guys are ready on July 1st or whatever. This falls under

the good problems to have. I got another would you rather for you. This one hit me over the weekend. For 2024 only, of the converted relievers pushing for spots in their rotations right now, who would you rather have out of Jordan Hicks, AJ Puck,

or the one we've talked about the least, Ronaldo Lopez, who seems to be making a move for that number five starter spot in Atlanta. I just talked to Jordan Hicks today about his stuff, and he was like, I'm not, I was trying to ask him about sinkers high in the zone. Did you want to talk about it?

He's like, I'm not doing that. No, not talking about it, but he's like, I'm not good at it. Yeah, he's like, I'm not good at it. I've gotten guys out up there, but my sinker is much better when I throw it down. So that is a really interesting thing that even trevor may was talking about in our pod about you know just mechanics of pitches being different to different places and it being really hard to throw like a right on right up and in slider you know but that's blue in the heat maps but like can

you actually throw it there you know so for bassett with his two planes uh you know two that's blue in the heat maps but like can you actually throw it there you know so for bassett with his two planes uh you know two seamer i think maybe it's a little bit easier for him to live up there uh but uh jordan hicks has a real sinker sinker so maybe it's just hard for him to throw it correctly you know high in the zone because it's just totally different mechanics for him you know so well maybe the misses would be in places that you don't want to miss in. Yeah, that was another thing that I think was brought up on Discord. You miss on a sinker and it drifts to high middle. That's a homer.

The nice thing about Jordan Hicks is, though, that he's throwing a four seam. He said that was a big deal for him last year, was throwing a four seam and throwing a splitter. He said over the course of the year, he got much more feel for both those pitches. In terms of an arsenal, I think Hicks and Lopez have better arsenals than Puck. So the question is, if you're going to be a starting pitcher, A, do you have the arsenal? And B, do you have the command? And I would say that Hicks and Lopez have really good stuff plus stuff based, you know know arguments for having good wide arsenals

hicks throws four seam sinker sweeper splitter that's he's got stuff for left he's got stuff for righties he's got everything ronaldo lopez is four seam slider uh curveball change like it's a pretty good arsenal and all those pitches are plus by stuff plus. Of course, some of those won't be as a starter, but it's a good enough, wide enough thing. Puck is pretty much, has been at least, four-seam fastball

sweeper. I'm looking for him to prove to me that he has a good changeup that will work. I'm a little bit nervous I'll pluck from a width of Arsenal standpoint the and then the next question is command puck had the best command on his fastball of these three right all the Lopez had the second best command Hicks had the third best command so you know I think ranking of Arsenals I go Hicks Lopez

puck ranking of command I go puck Lopez Hicks and so my answer is for this three-way would you rather I take Ronaldo Lopez actually I'm pretty surprised by this I watched him a little bit I thought it looked pretty good he's got a a wide arsenal. He's got decent command. Maybe with a new coaching staff, they can figure out the sequencing because I think I always thought that he could be better than he was in Chicago. Right. And I think there have been times

where we looked at Ethan Katz and been kind of excited about him as a pitching coach. I don't think it's all like a failure on a coach if you can't unlock a player. I think Lopez's flaws were known even before the White Sox traded for him years ago. I was surprised at how quick they kind of gave up on him as a starter, given that he made 65 starts in 2018 and 2019. Then he made all eight starts in 2020. It was brutal that year.

Split the season in the role in 2021 and then took off as a reliever kind of once they made that switch so i like i get it like you're trying to contend and maybe the circumstances nudged them down that path a little sooner than if they were in like the current rebuild phase they're in but the fact that atlanta went out there signed him said at the time they signed him they saw him as a starter you know that gives something to work off of. He's the cheapest of the three in a lot of leagues right now, so that's kind of a factor too. What I've come to is I'm comfortable.

I didn't used to like players that were trying to make this switch because I thought it was too difficult. I think we have enough information about the quality of pitches now to understand that some of these guys have a better chance of doing it than others. I think because Lopez has done it at the big league level before with high volume, that gives me a little more confidence in him.

That's the third question is volume, right? 280 inning seasons in the majors. That's huge compared to what Hicks and Puck have done. Puck is last in this one. Yeah. Puck is last. If you're talking about volume, mobility, Lopezicks puck so yeah i mean i'm i'm fairly interested in all three of these one of the other things is like especially in certain uh

formats like draft and hold sometimes you're cool with either scenario you know it's like innings or innings so you're you're buying innings on the cheap they could be good this way they could be good this way they's still going to be an arm that you can choose to start on a weekly basis you know they're still interesting and they go past all the established starters you know so you're picking

when you're picking Hicks, Puck and Lopez in a draft and hold a lot of times you're just picking against prospects which I'm always like am I really going to take a prospect? Like he could give me nothing all year. You know, he's like not really guaranteed innings in the major leagues or like injured

guys or relievers. So, you know, I think I'm interested in all three of these guys, the shallower the league gets, the more you can only be one of these guys. It has to be like your last pitcher. It has to be a free agency

league so that like if it doesn't work out you know like a middle reliever for one of these teams is not going to be that valuable so you know i i the shallower your team is the less i'm interested in these guys yeah that's where i met with hicks puck and lopez as well i had another build a bench request and this is less about the bench and more about the starting lineup, I think. It's how do the pieces fit in Cincinnati? When you do the build a bench with them, again, looking at roster resource, Luke Maley's the backup catcher. That's one spot. Jake Fraley and Will Benson kind of look like they are competing for a spot. So whoever you don't put in the starting lineup, they're both lefties, whoever you don't put in the

lineup ends up being a backup outfielder. And then maybe Stuart Fairchild gets a spot. That's probably the weakest roster spot. Jonathan India is the extra guy on roster resource. And health is a factor here too. You got Matt McClain coming back from an oblique injury. He could

play in a Cactus League game soon. Noel V. Marte is back from his hamstring injury. So there's a lot of good news in terms of players getting back for the Reds. But now that we're into spring training, have you adjusted the playing time expectations for this group?

Is there anybody you see playing more than the field thinks they're going to play? Anybody you think who's going to play less than the field thinks they're going to play anybody you think who's going to play less than the field thinks they're going to play well it's it's it's complicated to like use what's happened so far in spring to say much because uh really things can happen change so much on a day-to-day basis when you watch these lineups you'll notice that they'll bring in one starting lineup and then they just get a whole day off right so I could just be looking at this right now and somebody could get four plate appearances tonight or three plate appearances tonight and jump up this list right so number one right now in plate

appearances is Bubba Thompson they're taking a look and what that says to me is that something's going on in center field I think center field is somehow the key to understanding how this team is going to work otherwise ellie uh has gotten a lot of at-bats he's crushing it uh jamer has gotten a lot of at-bats uh the people who've gotten the least at-bats josh harrison i wouldn't think that he's much of a lock to make this team it's pretty crowded team anyway edwin arroyo i don't think he's making this team. So you can learn something from just looking at plate appearances. And for me, the thing that I'm learning is,

can Will Benson play center field? You know, can Jake Fraley still be a good center fielder? And if the answer is yes to either of those questions, I don't think Stuart Fairchild makes this roster. Because then you make Fraley or Benson your extra outfielder and backup center fielder. And then you basically go with four outfielders and India becomes your fifth outfielder sometimes, right?

Yeah, in a pinch. I mean, if someone got hurt in a game and you were short, you could put them out there. Right. But the thing is, if you think you have three center fielders in Friedel, Benson, and Fraley, then you can do that. If you think you have two or you have one, so that's why I'm interested that Bubba Thompson's getting all these at-bats, right?

two or you have one so that's why i'm interested that bubba thompson's getting all these at-bats right maybe bubba thompson is passing stewart fairchild for uh the last outfield spot if you give bubba thompson a roster spot because you think you need a backup center fielder other than benson or fraley then it gets a little tight because you got the loser of benson and fraley your backup center fielder uh and jonathan india as three guys who are not listed at the loser of Benson and Fraley, your backup center fielder, and Jonathan India as three guys who are not listed at the top of anything, and then your catcher. So that's it. That's everybody. That's with Marte at third, Candelario at first, India as your super sub, Bubba Thompson

as your backup center fielder, luke miley is your backup catcher i mean when i look at this i guess that works i mean that's why bubba thompson's gotten all those plate appearances right yeah he's got options fairchild doesn't so they could keep thompson to just send him down to triple a and make that switch later too so i don't know if if the opening day cutoff means that that fairchild's like won that spot all season that looks like a constant sort of battle for this team. If India is, in fact, the super sub, is that still enough of a role given his versatility

paired with the versatility of other players on the roster? Injuries are going to happen. Someone's going to get hurt. Even if Marte is healthy now, if McLean's healthy now or healthy on opening day, someone else might get hurt before then. Is there enough playing time here at cost for those key guys? McLean's healthy now or healthy on opening day. Someone else might get hurt before then. Is there enough playing time here at cost for those key guys?

I mean, the Candelario is not expensive. And even Christian Encarnacion-Strand for his projection, which is already like low for playing time. If you projected a full season for him, if you did like a 600 plate appearance projection, he'd jump up. He'd probably be a top 100 player pretty quickly with a full run of playing time. It looks like he's going to get something pretty close to that. I think India is worth

being in the mix with those guys. I think he's one of the biggest droppers in ADP though. I've picked him up, but I have to tell you, I was really surprised. I picked him up to be my third second baseman in a drafting hole that's how much he's falling and that made me think well you

know what this is actually at this price you know a bench pick in a 15-team league uh you know i'm back in because i do see i could see anybody getting hurt this spring. I could see this shaking out in the outfield differently. India has also been a surprisingly good player. I think it's kind of sad for him to have been prorated, at least pretty much a league average player. This is kind of a poor outcome for him. uh, you know, pro rated at least pretty much a league average player. Um, you know,

this is kind of a poor outcome for him. And from fantasy, he's been, you know, kind of like a 15, 15 type. That's been pretty valuable. Um,

but, uh, there are flaws, the defense, he doesn't hit the ball that hard. Um, and there's just, he's up against,

uh, players that are all young that defend better than him and hit the ball harder than him. You know, it's just, it's just the tough spot are all young, that defend better than him and hit the ball harder than him. He's just got stuck. He doesn't have that much trade value. We've talked about how league average guys don't have that much trade value. So he's most valuable to this team as just patch the hole wherever there's water coming in, basically.

I mean, it's kind of like the Orioles situation. It's not like any one of Hayes or Mountcastle or even O'Hearn patch the hole wherever there's water coming in, basically. I mean, it's kind of like the Orioles situation. It's not like any one of Hayes or Mountcastle or even O'Hearn are necessarily bad players. It's that you have younger, better players coming up behind them that are just better fits. And they may not have that much value trade-wise. What do you think Austin Hayes is getting you back? It's not much.

Someone might be desperate for a starting outfielder but they're they're free you could go sign tommy fam if you don't want to trade for austin hayes yeah what's what's the difference yeah so yeah i think that's why some of those guys are waiting around on the market to just be like wait wait for something to happen i think what's changed for me is that i'm with the market and i think ind might actually play the least if everybody's healthy, but he'll still play enough to be good in the situations that you described. I think that's where it's like, well, again, injuries

are going to give us some of the answers along the way. Generally, the Reds are not priced. They're not overinflated in price, especially considering the ballpark and the skills these guys have. I don't think there are players to hard avoid right now. I think now that Noel V. Marte is healthy again as long as he doesn't start

ticking up in ADP I might have to get a couple of Noel V. Marte shares on my rosters over the course of these next few weeks. Yeah generally just bet on the younger guys you'd think they'd have a little bit more upside I mean I'm a little surprised actually Jonathan India 96

WRC plus 99 WRC+, last two years. You know, I think that Marte could be better than that. We got one mailbag question we're going to get to here before we go. We'll save a few more mailbag questions for later in the week because I think the radio broadcast team is going to show up in that box any minute. This one comes from Market8Dude in our Discord. Yeah, look at that. It's cleaning out out there. Yeah, there's nobody on the field.

How much, if at all, do you pay attention to first half versus second half splits? Randy Rosaranda specifically comes to mind. First half last year, 279, 388, 476, 16 homers, 10 steals. Second half was 221, 331, 369 with 7 homers and 12 steals. So more broadly, how much do you care about first half versus second half splits?

I saw a piece by Jeff Zimmerman researching the predictive quality of each half. And the second half was slightly more predictive than the first half. But the full season was more predictive than either half. More information. That's what you'd expect. Right, right. Yeah, exactly. I do think that you can't just use that piece of research to say,

I never pay attention to second half splits, because especially with younger players, have they been figured out in some way? And you could just have, oh, they found his hole, with younger players have they been figured out in some way? You know? And you could just have, oh, they found his hole and for three months he couldn't do anything about it. I think with a Randy Rezarena

I don't think it's that likely they found a hole he can't cover. You know? I don't have an explanation for it. I suppose with older people you'd start to worry about fatigue. And maybe they just can't play an explanation for it. I suppose with older people, you'd start to worry about fatigue, and maybe they just can't play a full season anymore, but he's not that old either.

Maybe somebody could go and look through the heat maps and find some adjustment he wasn't making, but I do have faith in Randy Rosario. I think those are overused sometimes, but you can't ignore them completely. Yeah, I like to use them more to start digging in for more information. Was there an injury we didn't know about? Was there a swing change we didn't know about?

With pitchers, it's easier. Did the velo go up? Did the velo go down? Was there a new pitch? Those kinds of things are really easy to sort of work through. I think it probably is more important with a young player to watch those ebbs and flows sort of work through. I think it probably is more important with a young player to watch those ebbs and flows because of the adjustments.

That's a really good way to look at it. But it doesn't always have to be first half, second half. Sometimes it can just be a player debuted in August and we're looking at April and May and saying, hey, this is that window. We looked at David Schneider this way, right? Yeah, you don't always hit the adjustment phase depending on when you debut.

So sometimes the beginning of the next season is essentially your second half. It's the chance that the league has to really catch up. So it's more of that rolling view on fan graphs where you're looking at, what do the last 30 games look like? What do the last 50 games look like? And does that give us some sort of indication that someone has been solved or someone has unlocked something? So that's the way i would look at it if you see something as stark as those splits like those slash lines that's enough for me to dig around and say was a rosarena hurt did he hit by a pitch did he roll an ankle was there something going on in the second half did he hurt his shoulder

diving for a ball usually i go back i read old updates old player updates are the easiest way to get to find that stuff i go through the rotowire because one of the big ones was um that uh carl's career once told me i saw a dip in your exit below what's going on with that and he's like he's like well i was hurt like you can look it up and i looked it up and it was like a bad that was one of his ankle injuries and i was like oh yeah you ankle and then you you can annotate the exit velocity. He was like, whoa. You really weren't hitting the ball that hard after you were. And it's funny because some of those things won't be IL stints. So you can't just look at the transactions and be like, well, you didn't go to the IL last year.

Yeah, well, Chapman didn't really. I don't know if he went on the IL for his finger. I'm going to check after the show and see if there's even mentions of it. It's the kind of day-to-day thing that maybe pops up and sometimes we can't we don't even have access to it you have to like read beat writer notes or little tweaks tweets you know sometimes it's like oh he got banged up on a play last night he's out of the lineup today and everyone's like no big deal but then you're like whoa then he went in a slump after that you know right if i see nothing on rotowire i'm gonna ask caitlin mcgrath the blue jays writer for the athletic i said caitlin do then he went in a slump after that, you know? Right. If I see nothing on Roto-Wire, I'm going to ask Caitlin McGrath, Blue Jays writer for The Athletic,

I'll say, Caitlin, do you remember anything with a finger for Matt Chapman last year? And if she says no, then it's like, okay, we had no chance. Yeah, we had no chance of seeing that. It is something that is worth pointing out to all the people who are like, he was good in the first month and never good after.

Well, if there was a finger injury, that's a big part of it. you got unlimited time start watching tape from may and what wait for him to get hit in the hand or or catch a ball awkwardly at third or something that's that's the amount of time that unfortunately i do not have but uh somebody out there can sleuth that one out uh we are gonna go you know it's gonna get ejected from the radio box any moment now theathletic.com slash rates and barrels will get you a subscription if you're a new subscriber Thanks for listening.