Episode 2084: The Sexiest Free Agents Alive

Summary[]

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about norovirus derailing the GM meetings, leftover Boras quotes, and the baseball players deemed sexiest by People magazine, Stat Blast (18:47) about a possible bunting comeback and whether age is correlated with pitch-clock violations, and then (43:39) talk to FanGraphs writer Ben Clemens about the free-agent market and his ranking of the top 50 free agents.

Topics[]

Resurgence of bunting
Correlation between age and pitch-clock violations
Ben Clemens on the free agent market and his ranking of the top 50 free agents
Overall weak market for position players
Hyun-jin Ryu just missing the top 50
Shohei Ohtani clogging up the position player market until he signs (but not the pitcher market)
Yoshinobu Yamamoto's dominance in NPB
Difficulty of assessing Lee Jung-hoo
Shōta Imanaga, and his similarity to Kodai Senga
Yariel Rodriguez
Pitchers Blake Snell, Aaron Nola, and Jordan Montgomery
Teams most affected by this year's weak position player market

Banter[]

GM meetings shut down due to stomach virus
More Scott Boras quotes from the GM meetings
Sexiest baseball players according to People magazine: Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Cody Bellinger

Final Notes[]

Episode 208 follow-up: A listener says that he would be more likely to watch the winning team celebrate if he personally had a good series despite losing. Ben Lindbergh agrees.

Stat Blast[]

Resurgence of bunting[]

There appears to be renewed interest in bunting, possibly because the Diamondbacks were very successful with bunting this year.
Lucas Apostoleris of Baseball Prospectus assisted with this Stat Blast.
In 2023, the teams who bunted the least were the Braves, Dodgers, Mariners, and Rangers, mostly teams known for their offense. The teams who bunted the most were the A's, Diamondbacks, and Pirates.
In 2023, there were 1105 bunts, compared to 3301 in 2002 (as far back as we have data), barely a third.
Since 2002, the wRC+ for bunts in play (bunts that stayed fair) hovered in the 60-90 range, with spikes of 135 in 2020, 170 in 2022, and 162 this year. Those spikes correspond to seasons with the universal DH.
If you exclude pitcher bunting, the wRC+ is consistently above 100, increasing gradually and topping 150 in 2022 and 2023.
Ben observes that as bunt attempts have decreased, the wRC+ has increased. Defenses are less likely to defend the bunt since it happens less often, which makes surprise bunt attempts more sucessful. Also, there is selection bias: Bunt attempts are more likely to come from good bunters.
The effect of the zombie runner is also apparent: If you remove extra innings, the wRC+ for bunts goes up even more.

Correlation between age and pitch clock violations[]

Ben followed up on a prediction in Episode 1991 that older players are more likely to incur pitch clock violations.
Ben found a weak but positive 0.16 correlation between team age and pitch clock violations. The correlation went up to 0.19 if you correlated player age with violations.
Ben didn't find correlations with other factors like pitch velocity or pitcher pace.

Notes[]

Meg expresses great anxiety that her not feeling well is not because she's had very little sleep finishing the FanGraphs free agents post, but because she caught the norovirus at the GM meetings.
Meg had thought she had shaken her historical beat and shifted to covering players kissing each other, but her Twitter mentions about the GM meetings showed otherwise.
People Magazine named Patrick Dempsey the sexiest man alive. They had a special runner-up list of sports figures, and the baseball runner-ups were Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Cody Bellinger.
In the Reader's Choice poll, the race for sexiest athlete came down to Ohtani, Formula 1 driver Lewis Hamilton, and football players Joe Borrow and Travis Kelce. Kelce pulled ahead, presumably due to the fact that he's dating singer Taylor Swift.
Meg: "This is dangerous territory for me. As a lady who is also a media member, because you start talking about who's, you know, sexy. And that gets awkward very fast."
Meg is amused that People Magazine called Mookie Betts a multi-sport athlete because of his bowling. "When I think of sexy men, you know the first thing I think of? Bowlers."
Ben Lindbergh describes Cody Bellinger as having "resting high face" because he always looks like he's stoned.
Ben Clemens: "Last year was a hitting bonanza, and this year is just not that."
Ben Clemens doesn't understand why people rank Whit Merrifield so high.
Ben Lindbergh defends the phrase "more unique" (which Meg objects to), explaining that there are different ways something can be unique, and something that is unique across multiple criteria is "more unique".
Ben Clemens on Shohei Ohtani: "Whatever he wants, he's gonna get. It's just not gonna come down to money."
Fourteen GMs participated in MLB.com's anonymous survey on where Ohtani will end up. Ben Clemens is "extremely disappointed" in the four GMs who simply refused to answer. (The other 10 voted for the Dodgers.) He also doesn't understand why the other 16 GMs sat out. "This is free. It's probably relationship-building with this reporter. It's off the record. Just pick something."
Ben Clemens thinks that the Mariners are not being given enough consideration in the Ohtani chase.
Ben Clemens can't remember any year with this many foreign players being posted or becoming free agents.
Ben Clemens predicts that Yoshinobu Yamamoto will go the Mets. He doesn't believe that the Mets will be frugal despite their claims that they aren't trying to compete in 2024. Editor's note: Yamamoto went to the Dodgers, as discussed in Episode 2102.
Ben Clemens feels that Cody Bellinger's predicted contract is a bad deal. Kevin Kiermaier is a better value.
Ben Clemens feels that teams who were looking to improve their offense with mid-range talent are most hurt by this year's free agent market. On the other hand, the Cardinals are looking for pitching and will have good opportunities.