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Summary[]

Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller banter about the diminishing roles (and salaries) of MLB managers, then answer listener emails about whether it’s better for teams to be balanced than unbalanced and how to decide whether to upgrade on offense or defense, how consistently good a player has to be to make the Hall of Fame without ever leading the league, and what they love most about baseball, plus a Stat Blast about steroids and the league-wide distribution of dingers in the 2000s and today.

Topics[]

  • WAR distribution among offensive and defensive players on a team
  • Runs scored vs. runs saved
  • Player consistency at the Hall of Fame
  • Episode 1309 follow-up: Harold Baines' Hall of Fame case
  • Home run distribution and impact of steroids
  • Why Ben and Sam love baseball
  • Changing relationship to baseball
  • Baseball's shared history
  • Baseball's link to changes in society
  • Baseball's extensive historical data and narrative archive
  • Players returning early from injury

Banter[]

  • Mike Matheny has been rumored as a replacement for Ned Yost as the Royals' manager.
  • Don Mattingly signed a two year contract with the Marlins, taking a pay cut from his previous salary. This is part of a larger trend of decreasing manager salaries.
  • Sam feels that if GMs felt confident that managers were worth it then managers would be commanding higher salaries.

Email Questions[]

  • Ronak: "I was talking to my friend, a Phillies fan, about how the Phillies could improve this coming offseason given their disappointing season and when the idea of signing either of free agents Anthony Rendon or Gerrit Cole came up, my friend said he would definitely prefer that the Phillies try to sign Gerrit Cole because the Phillies are in need of pitching more than hitting. Does it matter how one team distributes its total projected WAR for a season into hitting WAR and pitching WAR? Let's say Anthony Rendon and Gerrit Cole both put up exactly 7.0 WAR next year.  Is there a certain point at which the Phillies adding Anthony Rendon to a team with good hitting and bad pitching actually adds less value than adding Gerrit Cole? I also wondered if in the history of world series winning teams there had been any teams with a very imbalanced distribution between their hitting and pitching WAR."
  • Scott (Singapore): "Mr. 10th Place: Inspired by the Mike Trout Black Ink Watch, I think it goes without saying that someone who finished first in every major statistical category for the duration of their career would be an unparalleled HOFer. The same is almost certainly true for someone finishing second. How far down the list would you have to go before that player was no longer a consensus all-time great? Does the reliability of finishing 8th in every category, every single year for say 15-ish seasons result in a noteworthy career? How about 15th? Consistency and compiling has to count for something but at some point the figures being compiled just don't add up to anything exciting."
  • Clare: "I sometimes struggle to capture in a succinct way just why I love baseball so much, and it’s got me wondering how you people are able to articulate it without rambling endlessly. Why do you each love baseball, and what do you think is the most lovable or compelling thing about this current baseball era?"

Stat Blast[]

  • In 2014 there were 44 players that qualified for the batting title with a single digit home run total. This year there are five.
  • Sam examines the increase in the quartile brackets for home run totals. Most have shifted up by amount 10 home runs.
  • Sam thinks this increase points to the impact that steroids had on home run totals for the top home run hitters in the 90s and early 2000s. While more players are hitting home runs there is not as large of an increase among the league's top home run hitters.

Notes[]

  • Ben and Sam estimate that a player who is consistently the 20th best player (or below) would not reach a Hall of Fame level.
  • Sam says he finds great pleasure in many of the main physical components of baseball (fielding, hitting, throwing, running). Sam also names baseball as a focal point in shared family history, baseball providing entertainment during boring activities, and the craving for baseball during the offseason.
  • Ben describes how his love for baseball has evolved since he was younger. Now he enjoys the ability for experimentation and getting answers about what works and doesn't about the game, in addition to the game's history and the volumes of writing it has produced.

Links[]

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