2023-2024 Cleveland Guardians Offseason Thread

[sportscoach]

Wild. Doesn't make sense to me.

He didn't have a strong 23 overall, but he is super young so I feel like he is getting underrated now, when he used to be slightly overrated at first...

 

[KluberSociety]

Hard to rank someone too high who has such a questionable hit tool and meh defense but he is still doing alright at AAA at a young age.

 

[Tondo]

He didn't have a strong 23 overall, but he is super young so I feel like he is getting underrated now, when he used to be slightly overrated at first...

He's been a BABIP victim, normalize it to 300ish and you're looking at 270/350/470 slash and he'd be in everyone's top 10, maybe even top 5.
He's at least a platoon bat and the age/level thing is real here, as is for many of our prospects. There were 47 prospects 23yo or under with 200+ PA in AAA last year. 7 of them Guardians.

We're too damn impatient with our talent. Just take a look at Willi Castro's Age/level progression for reference, and he wasn't even a top prospect, more like a Tena type. Most of these guys many display prospect fatigue on will most certainly be MLB players.

 

[sportscoach]

He's been a BABIP victim, normalize it to 300ish and you're looking at 270/350/470 slash and he'd be in everyone's top 10, maybe even top 5.
He's at least a platoon bat and the age/level thing is real here, as is for many of our prospects. There were 47 prospects 23yo or under with 200+ PA in AAA last year. 7 of them Guardians.

We're too damn impatient with our talent. Just take a look at Willi Castro's Age/level progression for reference, and he wasn't even a top prospect, more like a Tena type. Most of these guys many display prospect fatigue on will most certainly be MLB players.

We will see him if there is injuries... Do you think he has any chance of making this roster though?

 

[Criznit]

Hard to rank someone too high who has such a questionable hit tool and meh defense but he is still doing alright at AAA at a young age.

Turning 23 at the all-star break, Noel won't be known for being a defensive wiz, but he did come up as a 3B/1B before getting outfield reps. Also, though not a great indicator of defense chops, he only had one (official) error in 2023.

I think people see a big big fella and immediately think "DH". Wouldn't surprise me at all if he's at around average (maybe more?) as a right fielder or even 1st base. Definitely not a butcher, and not "like a surgeon" as Weird Al sang.

 

[Criznit]

We will see him if there is injuries... Do you think he has any chance of making this roster though?

In 2024? Definitely not breaking camp, but let's see how he's looking when the weather heats up. He might have 20ish homers by his birthday July 15th.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

"Prospect fatigue". That's a new one, but I love it.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

Saw this in Fangraphs. The guy decided to try and figure out which ballparks have the best hitting backgrounds. It sounds like the Prog is #1 in that category. He used the accuracy of umpires' calls on close pitches to make the determination. The better the hitting background the more accurate the calls was his presumption.

I found a much stronger correlation between umpire accuracy and swing rate on balls in the chase zone. However, the correlation was not in the direction that I expected. I expected a negative correlation, which would mean that when umpires were making more accurate calls, batters would chase less. Instead, it’s a positive correlation, which means that when accuracy went up, chase rate went up too. That might sound counterintuitive at first, but there’s also some logic in the idea that, even on pitches that are out of the zone, batters will be more likely to swing when they can see the ball better. The correlation coefficient is .52, and the scatterplot tells a convincing story...

This makes it pretty clear that in ballparks where umpires are more accurate, batters are chasing more. At the very top is Progressive Field in Cleveland...That lovely scatterplot is somewhat skewed by each home team’s natural tendencies. Let’s start with two examples: For the past several years, Cleveland has had great pitching and not so great hitting, both of which would drive up the chase rate at their home park....

In order to remove some of the bias that a team’s tendencies might bring into the numbers at their home park, I ran all of my numbers by team instead of by park — combining the stats for both their pitchers and their hitters — then I measured the difference between their home stats and their road stats. For that reason, I can tell you that when the Guardians are playing at home, umpires are 1.3 percentage points more accurate than when they’re on the road...

Once again, it’s fairly easy to see the general shape of the plot. Teams that have more accurate ball-strike calls when they play at home also tend to make more contact when they play at home. When umpires are seeing the ball well, so are batters...

Ballparks are different, and it only follows that if batters can see the ball better in some places, then umpires can see it better too. In ballparks where umpires are more accurate, batters chase more, but also they make more contact when they swing at good pitches...

Last year the Guardians were the third worst in the majors in out of zone swing percentage. They were also second best in zone contact percentage. Part of that may be because the hitters see the ball better here that at any other park. The umpires accuracy percentage is higher here than any other park (82.2% according to Statcast).

"...even on pitches that are out of the zone, batters will be more likely to swing when they can see the ball better."

Huh? I get that the statistics bear this out, but it seems that when batters see the ball BETTER they should be better able to discern whether it's a strike or not. I guess it's just a matter of when the batters are seeing the ball really well they can't help swinging at it.

Maybe the organization should do something to make the background LESS helpful to the hitters? (The entire pitching staff is nodding yes). Or maybe the Guardians' staff should do more nibbling? Bieber has been taking advantage of this for years by getting hitters to chase balls just off the edges in the "chase zone". He's in the right ballpark to maximize his style of pitching.

I was very critical of the Guardians' hitters last year for chasing more bad pitches than almost every other team, but it seems there is a bit of an excuse, at least in half their games.

Which Ballparks Make It Easiest to See the Pitch?

We can use the accuracy of ball-strike calls to figure out where it’s easiest to track the ball. When it’s easier to see the pitch, the game changes, sometimes in unexpected ways.

blogs.fangraphs.com

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

To follow up on the post above, umpire accuracy on balls and strikes varies by ballpark from 79% to 82%, so it's not a huge difference and I'm not sure how much it affects batter chase rates or how many runs per season the difference is.

The big takeaway to me is that the umps miss about 20% of the calls, regardless of the ballpark. They get 1 out of 5 pitches wrong. What a great argument for taking them out of the pitch calling business altogether now that the technology exists to do that.

Steven Kwan led the majors each of the last two years in taking pitches out of the zone that were wrongly called strikes (and it wasn't even close!). He might benefit the most from going to automated ball/strike calls.

 

[bob2the2nd]

To follow up on the post above, umpire accuracy on balls and strikes varies by ballpark from 79% to 82%, so it's not a huge difference and I'm not sure how much it affects batter chase rates or how many runs per season the difference is.

The big takeaway to me is that the umps miss about 20% of the calls, regardless of the ballpark. They get 1 out of 5 pitches wrong. What a great argument for taking them out of the pitch calling business altogether now that the technology exists to do that.

Steven Kwan led the majors each of the last two years in taking pitches out of the zone that were wrongly called strikes (and it wasn't even close!). He might benefit the most from going to automated ball/strike calls.

So I think bimbo hit on this but Kwan also faces so many pitches that percentages come into play. Yes he leads the league in missed calls from that side of the plate but he also seems the most pitches.


I believe is what's going on

 

[sportscoach]

So I think bimbo hit on this but Kwan also faces so many pitches that percentages come into play. Yes he leads the league in missed calls from that side of the plate but he also seems the most pitches.


I believe is what's going on

Hence why I think he is a very big part of this offense... He sees a lot of pitches which helps the guys behind him in the lineup

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

So I think bimbo hit on this but Kwan also faces so many pitches that percentages come into play. Yes he leads the league in missed calls from that side of the plate but he also seems the most pitches.


I believe is what's going on

Kwan has 1,201 AB's over the last two seasons so we're looking at roughly 5,000 pitches. So if 106 of them were balls that were called strikes I suppose that's not too big a deal. That's about 1 pitch in 50. I'm guessing he sees a little over 4 pitches per at-bat.

Edit: 4.15 pitches per at-bat in 2022 and 3.97 in 2003. I was right on the money.

 

[CalBuckeyeRob]

Kwan has 1,201 AB's over the last two seasons so we're looking at roughly 5,000 pitches. So if 106 of them were balls that were called strikes I suppose that's not too big a deal. That's about 1 pitch in 50. I'm guessing he sees a little over 4 pitches per at-bat.

Though many times an early strike impacts the entire at bat. You wonder if that evens out over time because there is nothing about his batting style that should lead to so many missed calls compared to others.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

Though many times an early strike impacts the entire at bat. You wonder if that evens out over time because there is nothing about his batting style that should lead to so many missed calls compared to others.

If anything you'd think umpires would give him the benefit of the doubt knowing he has an excellent batting eye.

When accurate electronic timing became available for track and field they did away with race officials timing runners with hand-held stopwatches. It's time for baseball to follow suit. A 20% error rate on balls and strikes is ridiculous. That's the best the human eye can do when the ball is going over 90 mph and the boundaries are determined by the location of the batters' knees and waist, or whatever they're using as the upper boundary.

What is the strike zone, anyway?

According to official MLB rules, the STRIKE ZONE is that area over home plate the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the kneecap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter’s stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball. - probaseballinsider.com

Yeah, right. Except that are we going by the front knee or the back knee? And what about players that crouch?

 

[CalBuckeyeRob]

If anything you'd think umpires would give him the benefit of the doubt knowing he has an excellent batting eye.

When accurate electronic timing became available for track and field they did away with race officials timing runners with hand-held stopwatches. It's time for baseball to follow suit. A 20% error rate on balls and strikes is ridiculous. That's the best the human eye can do when the ball is going over 90 mph and the boundaries are determined by the location of the batters' knees and waist, or whatever they're using as the upper boundary.

What is the strike zone, anyway?

According to official MLB rules, the STRIKE ZONE is that area over home plate the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the kneecap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter’s stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball. - probaseballinsider.com

Yeah, right. Except that are we going by the front knee or the back knee? And what about players that crouch?

View attachment 18949

The automated strike zone should be based on the height of the hitter so if you choose to bend over then your strike zone is higher.