I have always loved long toss. As someone who has always struggled with command, the ability to just launch the ball was liberating. As it became an everyday habit, my velocity began to climb. Training everything to fire in-sync, full speed certainly aids the body’s ability to do so on the mound, but it may... Continue Reading →

The title of this piece is one of my favorite Yogi Berra quotes ever. It is so direct, makes sense in some ways, but then again not really. Lately, I’ve been trying my best to master R. The process has included learning how to scrape data, manipulate data, and create ways to visualize data. I... Continue Reading →

The Padres are maniacs and I absolutely love it. Yu Darvish, Blake Snell, Dinelson Lamet, Chris Paddack… it is like they have gone wild on The Show’s franchise mode. How they managed these blockbusters without dealing their top prospects is worth its own conversation, but today I want to discuss the idea of marginal benefit.... Continue Reading →

Velocity in today’s game is certainly more central to the theme of the current pitching paradigm than ever before. More and more players are continuing to train by building up the capacities of their arm strength. Without this arm strength, a pitcher would be hard pressed to get an extended look from today’s talent evaluators.... Continue Reading →

Weighted On Base Average (wOBA) is widely considered one of the top metrics to approximate overall batting ability. wOBA is made by calculating how each hit outcome (singles, doubles, etc.) impact how many runs a team will score. Weights are then applied to each outcome similarly, but more accurately, than slugging percentage does. When it... Continue Reading →

Over his four year career, Adam Kolarek has grown a reputation for being one of the best lefty-killers in the MLB. With a low arm slot and bowling ball sinker, he is a tool perfectly designed for today's specialization and bullpen heavy game.  Against left handed batters, the scouting report is pretty straightforward: A heavy... Continue Reading →

A lot of being a great pitcher is related to being different or not average, like having a very low or high spin rate on a fastball. That trend is obvious with a certain pitcher; Tyler Rogers of the San Francisco Giants. As many of you know, Rogers is a submarine pitcher and has an... Continue Reading →

With the season over and free agency now underway, all eyes in the baseball world have shifted to this year’s free agent pool, and where the class will end up in 2021. While this year’s crop is extremely deep, standouts like Trevor Bauer, George Springer, Marcell Ozuna, JT Realmuto, and more headline the group and... Continue Reading →

Game 5 of the 2018 NLCS between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Milwaukee Brewers. Both teams were home run fueled and had caught fire in September leading into the playoffs. The Dodgers had future hall of famer Clayton Kershaw slated for the start. The Brewers, a more bullpen heavy team, indicated Wade Miley would... Continue Reading →

As highlighted in recent books such as Swing Kings by Jared Diamond and The MVP Machine by Ben Lindbergh and Travis Sawchik, many Major League hitters have been able transform their careers over recent years by turning to somewhat unconventional sources of information and coaching. Many of these players have turned to “swing whisperers” who... Continue Reading →

Every year, MLB teams continue to push the limit of what you can do with your defensive alignments. First it was standard infields shifts, and over time those got more and more extreme to the point where you now have players moving after each pitch, and they have been effective enough that the MLB is... Continue Reading →

Last offseason, the Braves splurged on their bullpen, spending a combined $57.75 million on Chris Martin, Will Smith, Darren O'Day and Josh Tomlin. Coming into the 2020 season, their bullpen represented approximately a third of the team's overall salary commitments. Meanwhile, the Kansas City Royals found themselves on the other end of the bullpen spectrum;... Continue Reading →

In 2020, Devin Williams took the league by storm. En route to posting a 0.33 ERA, Williams struck out 53% of batters he faced earning himself a spot in rookie of the year conversations. Fueling his rapid ascent was his screwball-like changeup, but how can we analyze what makes it elite? Plenty has been written... Continue Reading →

Tyler Glasnow is a damn good starting pitcher. Glasnow's always had that label. His talents were plenty evident during his time in the Pirates' farm system, but once Tampa Bay worked their magic on the tall righty, he turned into the second coming of Jacob deGrom. He's one head of the Rays' Cerberus of starting... Continue Reading →

In my last article, I built a model to predict the performance of every single at-bat to help with making bullpen decisions. As a reminder, I used a random-effects model with the random variables being times through the order and platoon matchup and the fixed effects being pitcher and hitter wOBAs. I decided I wanted... Continue Reading →