Changes: Episode 1849: When the Whiff Hits the Fan

Revision as of 19:33, 15 May 2022

Summary

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about a wave of baseball ads for cryptocurrencies and NFTs coinciding with crashes in the crypto and NFT markets, injuries to Bryce Harper and Clayton Kershaw, the dominance of the Dodgers, Yankees, and (especially of late) Astros, the early NL West race, Robinson Canó getting a job as Jarred Kelenic loses one, the Mariners' player development and the franchise's future, the managerial line of succession and an unlikely player-manager scenario, and Devin Williams and the limits of effective wildness, plus three "How can you not be pedantic about baseball?" terminology questions about describing scoring and strikeouts and recalling players, and a few closing followups.

Topics

Huge cryptocurrency/NFT crash just after teams started shilling for it
Bryce Harper and Clayton Kershaw injuries
Dominance of Dodgers, Yankees, and Astros, and the shape of the NL West
Robinson Canó lands at the Padres
Jarred Kelenic sent down by the Mariners
Mariners player development and future
Cleveland Guardians game postponement due to manager Terry Francona and many coaches testing positive for COVID-19
What happens if the entire coaching staff gets sick? Could a player be a temporary player-manager?
Devin Williams and the limits of effective wildness
"Recalling" a player for his debut
If two players score on a single play, is that "scoring once" or "scoring twice"?
"Fanned" vs. "punched out"
Follow-ups: Pitch clocks, Bobby Shantz injury treatment, skeumorphs, proposed rules for emergency backup catchers, Shohei Ohtani's prankster side

Email Questions

Peter: Small-sample, etc., but Milwaukee's Devin Williams currently has a 20.4% BB% and a 35.2% K%. Although his ERA is dinged by a bad outing, his FIP- is comfortably at 78.

My question is: how high do you think a pitcher's walk percentage can go and still be effective? I.e. is there an upper limit to being effectively wild?

It sure feels like 20% is a soft limit, but could a pitcher reasonably push that limit if they have more stuff to induce whiffs?

Peter: How come when an MLB player is making their debut from the minors they are "recalled" to the minors? It’s one thing If you’ve sent a prospect who isn’t performing his best to go back to AAA and then recall them, but what are we recalling these new prospects from? They've never been in the majors yet! Again, total pedantry but it feels somewhat incorrect.

Brett: I was watching the A's-Tigers game on Thursday, May 12, in which the A's scored 3 runs in the top of the first. The play-by-play announcer in the A's broadcast said the A's scored 3 times in the top of the first, but really, there were only two scoring plays: a Jed Lowrie RBI single and a Christian Bethancourt 2-run single. This isn't a perfect parallel, but it made me think of football, where if a team has 10 points, we wouldn't say it has scored 10 times; it scored twice, once in the touchdown and once in the field goal. At least in that context, we're referencing scoring plays, not individual instances of a point or run being added to the board.

So - in the inning in question, did the A's score three times, or did they score twice, bringing in three runs?

Ben: A big [nit-pick] for me is using "fanned" and "punched out" interchangeably. According to my understanding, to "fan" the batter specifically refers to a swinging strikeout (so named because the bat waves at the ball but does not touch it, like a fan), while to "punch" the batter "out" specifically refers to a looking strikeout (referring to the punching motion that the umpire makes in calling strike three).

I'm happy to give some leeway outside of the context of the specific play. If announcers want to say that the pitcher "has fanned nine tonight," or "has only pitched two innings but already has five punch-outs," that's fine with me -- saying the starter "has fanned four and punched out three" is both a mouthful and is likely to confuse some listeners. But when we've just watched the batter whiff on a two-strike pitch, announcers will still frequently say that the pitcher "gets the punch-out" despite the fact that everyone can plainly see that there was conspicuously no punching of any kind? That one really rankles me for whatever reason.

Notes

Cryptocurrency/NFT crash

Ben opens with a monologue dripping in dramatic irony: Inspired by recent baseball advertising, he says that he has decided to put all of his money in crypto and NFTs. (He was joking.)
The Nationals tweeted an ad for Terra's Luna cryptocurrency titled "Crypto 101" that consists of Nationals players doing baseball things while a narrator talks about cryptocurrency. After the ad went up, Luna crashed from $30.52 to one penny.
The Marlins tweeted about their NFT art display. During his monologue, Ben substitutes "loanShark Park" for "loanDepot Park".
MLB and the MLBPA issued a joint press release about their new NFT-based game.
The Nationals's five-year deal with Terra was signed in February. Meg points out that one of the risks of sponsorship is that your sponsor may blow up by the time the ads are ready.
Ben notes that crypto has been promoted by Larry David and Shohei Ohtani, "my favorite people on earth."

Bryce Harper and Clayton Kershaw injuries

Bryce Harper tore his UCL but is well enough to bat DH. The injury may last the entire season. Fortunately, most of Harper's entertainment value is on the batting side. Unfortunately, with Harper as DH, the Phillies will have to play Kyle Schwarber and Nick Castellanos in the outfield, which may contribute further to the Phillies's defensive follies.
"One cannot sustain on vibes alone," says Meg.
Clayton Kershaw is out with a pelvic injury, but hopefully not for long. Ben notes some people had "See, he got hurt anyway" takes, because Kershaw was pulled in the middle of a perfect game bid to avoid risk of injury.

The standings

The Dodgers lead MLB in run suppression, with the Yankees in second. The Dodgers are dominating even though their hitters are currently performing only at about league average (except for Freddie Freeman, who is actually quite good). "It's wild to think these guys could be better," says Meg.
All the teams in the NL West are above .500.
Nathan Eovaldi leads in HR/9. Sorry, Nathan.
Mike Trout has moved to the top of the AL in WAR. Only Manny Machado of the Padres is ahead of him.
Ben is hoping for a three-way race for the NL West this year. Last year's race fizzled out when the Padres faded.
The Astros have given up only 11 runs in their last 10 games. This hasn't been accomplished since 1974.

Robinson Canó and Jarred Kelenic and the Mariners

Robinson Canó and Jarred Kelenic were traded for each other, and their fates continue to be linked: Canó was signed by the Padres at the same time Kelenic was sent down. The Mariners head to New York for a series against the Mets, so the narrative continues.
For the Mariners, Julio Rodríguez is much improved, but Mitch Haniger is injured. The Mariners have a reputation for being good at developing pitching talent, not so much hitting.
Meg lays out ways the Mariners could turn their season around. Ben says that "a lot of things have to go right" for them to do well this year, but maybe next year will be their year.
Ben quips, "They should have built the whole team out of Ty France."

Guardians game postponement and player-managers

Ben wonders, if the entire coaching staff got sick, could the "managerial line of succession" eventually reach a player, leading to a temporary return of the player-manager?
Ben says he's not thinking of going "the whole Lou Boudreau". Boudreau was the Cleveland player-manager for 9 seasons. In 1948, he both won the AL MVP award and led Cleveland to their second ever World Series title.
Meg says that it would never happen. Teams would call up their AAA manager or use a member of the front office as temporary manager. If that were not possible, the team would just postpone the game rather than name a player-manager.
Ben suggests that maybe in 2014, Cleveland could have named Jason Giambi as player-manager, since he was not being used much and had managerial aspirations.
Meg considers Andrew Miller in 2016, who could have managed on days he was unavailable as a reliever.

The limits of effective wildness

Ben found that the 20% walk rate cap is in practice a hard limit. Only one pitcher had that high a walk rate, and it was "Wild Thing" Mitch Williams in 1987.
Devin Williams hasn't given up any home runs, so that swings in his favor. Meg says that teams may keep him despite his walk rate, but change how he is deployed.

Pedantic corner

Meg feels vindicated that others are as pedantic about baseball as she is.
Ben reminds us that the "How can you not be pedantic about baseball?" T-shirt is coming.

Recalling a player who was never in the majors to begin with

Ben notes that the term is technically correct, because the player joined the 40-player roster when they were picked in the Rule 5 draft, then were sent down, then came back. Nevertheless, he wouldn't use the term that way himself and prefers to say "promoted".
Meg says that the term "recall" has "remember" as a synonym, and that makes you think you should Remember That Guy, which you don't, because you have no memory of that guy.

What does it mean to score twice?

Meg and Ben both disagree with Brett. Meg points out that each "score" is a separate event: A different runner touches home plate. You can have multiple players score on a single play.

Fanned vs. punched out

Meg agrees with the distinction but also isn't bothered when people conflate the terms. She nevertheless supports those who are annoyed by it.
Ben wishes there were more synonymous for "strikeout" because he finds himself using the same terms over and over. "I do kind of appreciate the distinction and even applaud the distinction, and yet I resent the distinction."
Meg finds that "whiff" makes her think the pitcher smelled the batter (took a good whiff of).

End-of-episode notes

Ben notes that the episode number is 1849, which is the year that many people lost their fortunes in speculative mining.
Episode 1848 follow-ups about pitch clocks:
- A listener points out that clocks were unreliable in the 1960's because quartz movement hadn't become available until the 1980's. The clocks in the 1960's were mechanical.
- Another listener points out that electronic clocks can be unreliable even today. In a recent NBA playoff game, one of the 24-second clocks stopped working, and by rule, they had to shut off both of them.
Episode 1848 follow-up about Bobby Shantz: A listener surmised that Shantz may have had a "ganglion cyst", for which a historical treatment is to slam a book on it. However, Ben found an interview with Shantz where he said that he injured his hand playing touch football. Ben does admit the possibility that Shantz's memory was flawed.
Episode 1846 follow-up: A listener notes that all-turf fields typically do have home plate embedded in the turf (to Ben's relief). The umpire is brushing off the infill, the fake "dirt" that is used to provide cushioning and support.
Episode 1847 follow-up: Ben recalls that in Episode 1202, he and Jeff discussed the hockey emergency backup goalie and ways it could be brought to baseball. Nevertheless, Ben like seeing Josh VanMeter catch, so we can see how good a non-catcher would do at catching.
Ben calls our attention to a Stephanie Apstein story about Shohei Ohtani's prankster streak.

@@ Line 19: / Line 19: @@
 | outro=[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4mbBgtUyqI The Byrds, "Take a Whiff on Me"]
-}}{{#vardefine:downloadlink|https://media.blubrry.com/effectively_wild/s/cdn-podcasts.fangraphs.com/EffectivelyWildEpisode1849.mp3}}{{IncompleteNotice}}
+}}{{#vardefine:downloadlink|https://media.blubrry.com/effectively_wild/s/cdn-podcasts.fangraphs.com/EffectivelyWildEpisode1849.mp3}}
 ==Summary==
 ''Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about a wave of baseball ads for cryptocurrencies and NFTs coinciding with crashes in the crypto and NFT markets, injuries to [[Bryce Harper]] and [[Clayton Kershaw]], the dominance of the Dodgers, Yankees, and (especially of late) Astros, the early NL West race, [[Robinson Canó]] getting a job as [[Jarred Kelenic]] loses one, the Mariners' player development and the franchise's future, the managerial line of succession and an unlikely player-manager scenario, and [[Devin Williams]] and the limits of effective wildness, plus three "How can you not be pedantic about baseball?" terminology questions about describing scoring and strikeouts and recalling players, and a few closing followups.''
 ==Topics==
+* Huge cryptocurrency/NFT crash just after teams started shilling for it
-* {List or summarize the main topics, noting prominently mentioned players or teams and making internal wiki links to them (even if those pages have not been created yet).}
+* [[Bryce Harper]] and [[Clayton Kershaw]] injuries
+* Dominance of Dodgers, Yankees, and Astros, and the shape of the NL West
-==Banter==
+* [[Robinson Canó]] lands at the Padres
-* {- If applicable. For banter, note prominent teams and players, and make internal links for them.
+* [[Jarred Kelenic]] sent down by the Mariners
-- Links and mentions do NOT have to be made for players and teams mentioned in passing.}
+* Mariners player development and future
+* Cleveland Guardians game postponement due to manager [[Terry Francona]] and many coaches testing positive for COVID-19
+* What happens if the entire coaching staff gets sick? Could a player be a temporary player-manager?
+* [[Devin Williams]] and the limits of effective wildness
+* "Recalling" a player for his debut
+* If two players score on a single play, is that "scoring once" or "scoring twice"?
+* "Fanned" vs. "punched out"
+* Follow-ups: Pitch clocks, [[Bobby Shantz]] injury treatment, skeumorphs, proposed rules for emergency backup catchers, [[Shohei Ohtani]]'s prankster side
 ==Email Questions==
+* Peter: Small-sample, etc., but Milwaukee's [[Devin Williams]] currently has a 20.4% BB% and a 35.2% K%. Although his ERA is dinged by a bad outing, his FIP- is comfortably at 78.<br><br>My question is: how high do you think a pitcher's walk percentage can go and still be effective? I.e. is there an upper limit to being effectively wild?<br><br>It sure feels like 20% is a soft limit, but could a pitcher reasonably push that limit if they have more stuff to induce whiffs?
-* {For EMAIL episodes: copy the question and who asked it from the [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-8lpspHQuR5GK7S_nNtGunLGrx60QnSa8XLG_wvRb4Q/edit#gid=0 question database], and link prominent teams and players.}
+* Peter: How come when an MLB player is making their debut from the minors they are "recalled" to the minors? It’s one thing If you’ve sent a prospect who isn’t performing his best to go back to AAA and then recall them, but what are we recalling these new prospects from? They've never been in the majors yet! Again, total pedantry but it feels somewhat incorrect.
-==Stat Blast==
-* {For STAT BLAST segment: transcribe the scenario that the host is trying to answer (you do NOT have to transcribe the method used within the Stat Blast, but note its findings and any other pertinent info.)}
+* Brett: I was watching the A's-Tigers game on Thursday, May 12, in which the A's scored 3 runs in the top of the first. The play-by-play announcer in the A's broadcast said the A's scored 3 times in the top of the first, but really, there were only two scoring plays: a Jed Lowrie RBI single and a Christian Bethancourt 2-run single. This isn't a perfect parallel, but it made me think of football, where if a team has 10 points, we wouldn't say it has scored 10 times; it scored twice, once in the touchdown and once in the field goal. At least in that context, we're referencing scoring plays, not individual instances of a point or run being added to the board.<br><br>So - in the inning in question, did the A's score three times, or did they score twice, bringing in three runs?
+* Ben: A big [nit-pick] for me is using "fanned" and "punched out" interchangeably.  According to my understanding, to "fan" the batter specifically refers to a swinging strikeout (so named because the bat waves at the ball but does not touch it, like a fan), while to "punch" the batter "out" specifically refers to a looking strikeout (referring to the punching motion that the umpire makes in calling strike three).<br><br>I'm happy to give some leeway outside of the context of the specific play.  If announcers want to say that the pitcher "has fanned nine tonight," or "has only pitched two innings but already has five punch-outs," that's fine with me -- saying the starter "has fanned four and punched out three" is both a mouthful and is likely to confuse some listeners.  But when we've just watched the batter whiff on a two-strike pitch, announcers will still frequently say that the pitcher "gets the punch-out" despite the fact that everyone can plainly see that there was conspicuously no punching of any kind?  That one really rankles me for whatever reason.
 ==Notes==
+'''Cryptocurrency/NFT crash'''
-* {List noteworthy tangents, quotes, highlights, miscellany not covered above.}
+* Ben opens with a monologue dripping in dramatic irony: Inspired by recent baseball advertising, he says that he has decided to put all of his money in crypto and NFTs. (He was joking.)
+* The Nationals tweeted an ad for Terra's Luna cryptocurrency titled "Crypto 101" that consists of Nationals players doing baseball things while a narrator talks about cryptocurrency. After the ad went up, Luna crashed from $30.52 to one penny.
+* The Marlins [https://twitter.com/MarlinsComms/status/1524019519949352961 tweeted about their NFT art display]. During his monologue, Ben substitutes "loanShark Park" for "loanDepot Park".
+* MLB and the MLBPA issued a joint press release about their new NFT-based game.
+* The Nationals's five-year deal with Terra was signed in February. Meg points out that one of the risks of sponsorship is that your sponsor may blow up by the time the ads are ready.
+* Ben notes that crypto has been promoted by Larry David and [[Shohei Ohtani]], "my favorite people on earth."
+'''Bryce Harper and Clayton Kershaw injuries'''
+* [[Bryce Harper]] tore his UCL but is well enough to bat DH. The injury may last the entire season. Fortunately, most of Harper's entertainment value is on the batting side. Unfortunately, with Harper as DH, the Phillies will have to play [[Kyle Schwarber]] and [[Nick Castellanos]] in the outfield, which may contribute further to the Phillies's defensive follies.
+* "One cannot sustain on vibes alone," says Meg.
+* [[Clayton Kershaw]] is out with a pelvic injury, but hopefully not for long. Ben notes some people had "See, he got hurt anyway" takes, because Kershaw was [[Episode 1836: To Me, You Are Perfect|pulled in the middle of a perfect game bid]] to avoid risk of injury.
+'''The standings'''
+* The Dodgers lead MLB in run suppression, with the Yankees in second. The Dodgers are dominating even though their hitters are currently performing only at about league average (except for [[Freddie Freeman]], who is actually quite good). "It's wild to think these guys could be better," says Meg.
+* All the teams in the NL West are above .500.
+* [[Nathan Eovaldi]] leads in HR/9. Sorry, Nathan.
+* [[Mike Trout]] has moved to the top of the AL in WAR. Only [[Manny Machado]] of the Padres is ahead of him.
+* Ben is hoping for a three-way race for the NL West this year. Last year's race fizzled out when the Padres faded.
+* The Astros have given up only 11 runs in their last 10 games. This hasn't been accomplished since 1974.
+'''Robinson Canó and Jarred Kelenic and the Mariners'''
+* [[Robinson Canó]] and [[Jarred Kelenic]] were traded for each other, and their fates continue to be linked: Canó was signed by the Padres at the same time Kelenic was sent down. The Mariners head to New York for a series against the Mets, so the narrative continues.
+* For the Mariners, [[Julio Rodríguez]] is much improved, but [[Mitch Haniger]] is injured. The Mariners have a reputation for being good at developing pitching talent, not so much hitting.
+* Meg lays out ways the Mariners could turn their season around. Ben says that "a lot of things have to go right" for them to do well this year, but maybe next year will be their year.
+* Ben quips, "They should have built the whole team out of [[Ty France]]."
+'''Guardians game postponement and player-managers'''
+* Ben wonders, if the entire coaching staff got sick, could the "managerial line of succession" eventually reach a player, leading to a temporary return of the player-manager?
+* Ben says he's not thinking of going "the whole [[Lou Boudreau]]". Boudreau was the Cleveland player-manager for 9 seasons. In 1948, he both won the AL MVP award and led Cleveland to their second ever World Series title.
+* Meg says that it would never happen. Teams would call up their AAA manager or use a member of the front office as temporary manager. If that were not possible, the team would just postpone the game rather than name a player-manager.
+* Ben suggests that maybe in 2014, Cleveland could have named [[Jason Giambi]] as player-manager, since he was not being used much and had managerial aspirations.
+* Meg considers [[Andrew Miller]] in 2016, who could have managed on days he was unavailable as a reliever.
+'''The limits of effective wildness'''
+* Ben found that the 20% walk rate cap is in practice a hard limit. Only one pitcher had that high a walk rate, and it was "Wild Thing" [[Mitch Williams]] in 1987.
+* [[Devin Williams]] hasn't given up any home runs, so that swings in his favor. Meg says that teams may keep him despite his walk rate, but change how he is deployed.
+'''Pedantic corner'''
+* Meg feels vindicated that others are as pedantic about baseball as she is.
+* Ben reminds us that the "How can you not be pedantic about baseball?" T-shirt is coming.
+'''Recalling a player who was never in the majors to begin with'''
+* Ben notes that the term is technically correct, because the player joined the 40-player roster when they were picked in the Rule 5 draft, then were sent down, then came back. Nevertheless, he wouldn't use the term that way himself and prefers to say "promoted".
+* Meg says that the term "recall" has "remember" as a synonym, and that makes you think you should [[Remember Some Guys|Remember That Guy]], which you don't, because you have no memory of that guy.
+'''What does it mean to score twice?'''
+* Meg and Ben both disagree with Brett. Meg points out that each "score" is a separate event: A different runner touches home plate. You can have multiple players score on a single play.
+'''Fanned vs. punched out'''
+* Meg agrees with the distinction but also isn't bothered when people conflate the terms. She nevertheless supports those who are annoyed by it.
+* Ben wishes there were more synonymous for "strikeout" because he finds himself using the same terms over and over. "I do kind of appreciate the distinction and even applaud the distinction, and yet I resent the distinction."
+* Meg finds that "whiff" makes her think the pitcher smelled the batter (took a good whiff of).
+'''End-of-episode notes'''
+* Ben notes that the episode number is 1849, which is [[w:California Gold Rush|the year that many people lost their fortunes in speculative mining]].
+* [[Episode 1848: Shantz Encounter|Episode 1848]] follow-ups about pitch clocks:
+** A listener points out that clocks were unreliable in the 1960's because quartz movement hadn't become available until the 1980's. The clocks in the 1960's were mechanical.
+** Another listener points out that electronic clocks can be unreliable even today. In a recent NBA playoff game, one of the 24-second clocks stopped working, and by rule, they had to shut off both of them.
+* [[Episode 1848: Shantz Encounter|Episode 1848]] follow-up about [[Bobby Shantz]]: A listener surmised that Shantz may have had a "ganglion cyst", for which a historical treatment is to slam a book on it. However, Ben found an interview with Shantz where he said that he injured his hand playing touch football. Ben does admit the possibility that Shantz's memory was flawed.
+* [[Episode 1846: One-Night Standings|Episode 1846]] follow-up: A listener notes that all-turf fields typically do have home plate embedded in the turf (to Ben's relief). The umpire is brushing off the infill, the fake "dirt" that is used to provide cushioning and support.
+* [[Episode 1847: We Want a Catcher, Not a Belly-Scratcher|Episode 1847]] follow-up: Ben recalls that in [[Episode 1202: The Strike Zone is Scary|Episode 1202]], he and Jeff discussed the hockey emergency backup goalie and ways it could be brought to baseball. Nevertheless, Ben like seeing [[Josh VanMeter]] catch, so we can see how good a non-catcher would do at catching.
+* Ben calls our attention to a Stephanie Apstein story about [[Shohei Ohtani]]'s prankster streak.
 ==Links==
@@ Line 67: / Line 141: @@
 *[https://www.si.com/mlb/2022/05/13/shohei-ohtani-goofball-daily-cover Link to Ohtani prankster story]
 [[Category:Episodes]]
-[[Category:Incomplete Episode Page]]
+[[Category:Email Episodes]]
 [[Category:Ben Lindbergh Episodes]]
 [[Category:Meg Rowley Episodes]]