Stolen Signs

We talk about the Great Home Run Surge of 2019, the Rabbit Ball, Slippier in the Air Ball, the call up of Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Alex Rodriguez on YouTube. Links: * Moonshot: The Baseball Is Juiced (Again) by Robert Arthur * Moonshot: Exit Velocity Is Higher Than Ever by Robert Arthur * Moonshot: The Rabbit Ball is Flying in Triple-A Too by Robert Arthur * The Call-Up: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. by Jarrett Seidler and Kevin Jebens * Circle Change: Who’s Hitting the Extra Dingers? by Zach Crizer * Kendall's writing for the Prospectus Notebook * ARod on YouTube

We talked with Jared Diamond about recent MLB rules changes. Specifically related to one of our favorite subjects, two-way players. We address how teams will have to designate players as, pitchers, hitters, or two-way and what effect those rules will have on the game. We also get a peak into Jared's upcoming book. Harry and Kendall also dig into some of the upcoming changes that MLB will be testing out in the Atlantic League.

We chatted with the creators and maintainers of four major projection systems, ZiPS (Dan Szymborski (https://twitter.com/DSzymborski)), Steamer (Jared Cross (https://twitter.com/steamerpro)), THE BAT (Derek Carty (https://twitter.com/DerekCarty)) and Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA (https://www.baseballprospectus.com/pecota-projections/) (Harry Pavlidis (https://twitter.com/harrypav)) about how their systems are created, how the past is used to project future performance and how projecting young players without much track record can be tricky. Music is "Open Your Face (https://parkerprojection.bandcamp.com/track/open-your-face)" by Parker Projection (https://open.spotify.com/artist/71yR5UGfJkZHeJ9kk3pezD?si=690DNsrQQHOLRBrNdcqM4g).

Deep dive into DRC+ and PECOTA with Jonathan Judge and Rob McQuown of Baseball Prospectus. Stats Chat DRC Updates and Improvements DRC+ and Observables All DRC+ coverage Projected Standings based on PECOTA How to watch Serie del Caribe 2019

Shohei Ohtani revisited, baseball Hall of Fame bar lowering and how it affects who gets in, lining up optimal player development and what happens when you launch a new statistic. Available at Baseball Prospectus (https://www.baseballprospectus.com/podcasts/episode-32-how-big-can-this-hall-get/)

Harry and Kendall talk about the quantifying The Opener phenomenon, Bill James' comments about replacing players, trying to figure out if regular baseball fans could visibly tell the difference between top MLB talent and replacement level talent. Then cap it off with a discussion about the changes at Baseball Prospectus.

In the playoffs (and always) pitching and catching are important Donate to the Lupus Foundation (http://bit.ly/2O7rtgh) Required Reading The unlucky legacy of the 2018 Houston Astros (http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/25024557/the-unlucky-legacy-2018-houston-astros) by Sam Miller (https://twitter.com/sammillerbb) Joel Sherman writes about the plight of catchers (https://nypost.com/2018/10/24/its-not-just-gary-inside-the-catching-plague-thats-only-getting-worse/)

We talk about how you build a baseball team for the playoffs and the future. It’s good to talk about baseball. Enjoy the playoffs.

Harry and Kendall talk about the Women's Baseball World Cup, then look at how the number of

We visit with Jason Benetti, television play by play announcer for the Chicago White Sox. We talk with him about his start in the business, taking over for a broadcasting legend, how he integrates Steve Stone's first hand knowledge, with the plethora of statistical data he has access to. We also touch on the All Star Game and how catchers are evaluated for the Hall of Fame.

Talking about the materials that make up a baseball with Dr. Meredith Wills (https://twitter.com/Bbl_Astrophyscs). We also revisit two-way players, dig into defensive metrics and why they're difficult, and are reminded that everything old is new again. How one tiny change to the baseball may have led to both the home run surge and the rise in pitcher blisters (https://theathletic.com/381544/2018/06/06/how-one-tiny-change-to-the-baseball-may-have-led-to-both-the-home-run-surge-and-the-rise-in-pitcher-blisters/) Angels Live: What to make of ‘Seam Study’ (https://www.foxsports.com/west/video/1252393539925)

R.J. Anderson of CBS Sports came on to talk with us about the Rays recent usage of Sergio Romo as a starting pitcher. We talk about whether this concept will continue and if there may be other teams willing to try it out. We also talk with Anthony Rescan about his Baseball Prospectus Intern project for calculating surplus draft value. We threw in a handful of things we've learned over the last few weeks including tidbits about Kendrys Morales, Jordan Hicks, and the predictive value of xStats. How Sergio Romo and the Rays 'opener' strategy are impacting how pitching stats are tracked and viewed Kendrys Morales: An All-Time Unlikely Base Stealer by Mike Passador

We discuss the Report of the Committee Studying Home Run Rates in Major League Baseball released on May 24, 2018. We talk with committee chair Dr. Alan Nathan, and committee member Dr. Dan Brooks as well as radar and target tracking research engineer, Dr. Sean O'Rourke. We examine what the report is saying and what it means going forward.

Sam Miller joined us to talk about his recent article about evaluating Statcast's new Pop Time metric. Surprising exactly no one, we also talk about Shohei Ohtani, again. And take a look at Robinson Cańo's Hall of Fame candidacy. 'Pop' science: Your guide to learning a new MLB stat by Sam Miller Usain Bolt playing baseball by Sam Miller A big step forward in measuring command by Eno Sarris CMD from Baseball Prospectus What Makes a Good Change Up? Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 by Harry Pavlidis Below is a table showing the comparative ratings of some of the pitchers with the best command scores. Command+ CMD Name 1 9 Kyle Hendricks 2 19 Jordan Zimmermann 3 21 Alex Wood 4 10 Jeremy Hellickson 5 64 Masahiro Tanaka 6 86 Josh Tomlin * 7 25 Aaron Nola 8 12 Tyler Mahle 9 6 Jacob deGrom 10 3 Zack Greinke 12 4 Corey Kluber 20 2 Marco Gonzales 23 1 Kyle Davies 53 8 Doug Fister 101 5 Marco Estrada 122 7 CC Sabathia Data pulled a few days apart, 151 total pitchers in COMMAND+ rankings and 130 in CMD * Tomlin ranked sixth in CMD in 2017 Shohei Ohtani is flexible https://twitter.com/shinjibvby/status/996478920110190592

Baseball is back and we're all so glad

2:32 Revisiting PECOTA team projections 10:44 Announce winners of The Shift by Russell A. Carleton giveaway 14:40 Spin Rates and Pitch Design with Jeff Long 1:08:45 Home Runs Have Surged in MLB — Baseball Experts Explain Why NBC Left Field (h/t Rob Arthur) Other Links What would happen if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90% the speed of light? Ellen McManis

When we talk about park adjusted stats, and park factors, what does all of that mean? How do we arrive at those numbers and how do we account for changes over time? We also talk about "pitch design" and how that combines analytical data and player development. Links: The Shift: The Next Evolution in Baseball Thinking by Russell A. Carleton Basics Of Pitch Design Using Rapsodo Baseball Prospectus' Park Factors by Handedness

We talk with Jonathan Judge (https://twitter.com/bachlaw) and Rob McQuown (https://twitter.com/Robmcquown), who oversee Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA projections (https://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/fantasy/dc/) to get some more insight into how the projections are made, what's new this year, and of course hip hop. Sam Miller (https://twitter.com/SamMillerBB) asks how much we'd be willing to endure to play Major League Baseball (http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/22381495/put-coach-how-much-embarrassment-willing-endure-play-major-league-baseball)

We talk to Jeff Long (https://twitter.com/JeffLongBP), Sean O'Rourke (https://twitter.com/dj_mosfett), Wayne Boyle (https://twitter.com/PitchGrader), and Russell Carleton (https://twitter.com/pizzacutter4) about their recent Pitching Week (https://www.baseballprospectus.com/tag/pitching-week/) article about the Robot Strikezone and Robot Umpires (https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/37347/robo-strike-zone-not-simple-think/). New Power, Command, Stamina pitching metrics (http://legacy.baseballprospectus.com/sortable/index.php?cid=2507171) from Baseball Prospectus Updating Pitch Tunnels (https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/37436/prospectus-feature-updating-pitch-tunnels/) - by Jeff Long, Harry Pavlidis, and Martin Alonso (https://twitter.com/martnar) Jeff Long, Jonathan Judge (https://twitter.com/bachlaw) and Harry are nominated for a SABR Analytics Conference Research Award (http://sabr.org/about/sabr-analytics-conference-research-awards) The Hazards of Going on Auto-Pilot (https://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/hazards-automation) - by Maria Konnikova

Stolen Signs is back. Harry and Kendall talk about the slow offseason, collusion and ideas on how to change the economics of baseball. After a short break (14:05) they discuss new research by Duke University that looks into neurological and motor skills and how they translate to baseball production, a new smart baseball that can provide some pitch tracking and tease some new work by the stats team at Baseball Prospectus. To wrap up (32:00), a look into the state of pitching and try to talk about what an inning(s) eater is and also what an ace is. Neuroscience Can Project Batting Lines Now (https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/neuroscience-can-project-batting-lines-now/) by Eno Sarris (https://twitter.com/enosarris) Anthony DiComo's tweet of Sandy Alderson quote (https://twitter.com/AnthonyDiComo/status/953740175024193536) Here's why baseball's economic system might be broken (https://sports.yahoo.com/heres-baseballs-economic-system-might-broken-224638354.html) by Jeff Passan (https://twitter.com/jeffpassan)

We touch on many issues of the day as we wrap up 2017 in style. 3:10 - Marlins firesale fallout - Dan LeBatard show (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDT-a7fh5fc) 17:05 - Bob Bowman forced out at MLBAM (https://www.wsj.com/articles/baseballs-rainmaker-forced-out-after-alleged-misconduct-1513882805) 23:38 - Shohei Ohtani ZIPS, Steamer and PECOTA projections 35:20 - The Case for Long-Form Movement (https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/36603/pitching-backward-case-long-form-movement/) by Jeff Long (https://twitter.com/JeffLongBP) 51:00 - Major League Baseball's Statcast Can Break Sabermetrics (https://deadspin.com/major-league-baseballs-statcast-can-break-sabermetrics-1820987737) by Emma Baccellieri (https://twitter.com/emmabaccellieri) 1:19:20 - Hall of Fame discussion - HOF Tracker (https://onedrive.live.com/view.aspx?resid=F2E5D8FC5199DFAF!8063&ithint=file,xlsx&app=Excel&authkey=!AAAsz3uDsmqy_Vw) c/o @NotMrTibbs (https://twitter.com/NotMrTibbs) With that we bid you farewell for the year. Happy holidays to all, and we look forward to 2018.

We talk with Ben Lindbergh and Kaz Yamazaki about the NPB posting system, differences between the mounds, balls, culture of MLB and NPB and dig a little deeper into some of the myths about Japanese pitchers coming over to MLB. We also look into the current state of the sabermetric community in Japan. Effectively Wild Episode 1145: The Reigning-MVP Podcast (https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/effectively-wild-episode-1145-the-reigning-mvp-podcast/) Effectively Wild episode where Ben and Jeff Sullivan talk with Dennis Sarfate Shohei Otani and MLB's Japanese Fragility Myth (https://www.theringer.com/mlb/2017/12/5/16737454/shohei-ohtani-history-of-japanese-pitchers-in-mlb) from The Ringer Shohei Otani's life goals (http://m.mlb.com/cutfour/2017/12/06/262926572/check-out-shohei-ohtanis-life-goals-that-he-wrote-out-in-high-school) Delta Graphs (http://1point02.jp/op/index.aspx)

We welcome Sean Forman from Baseball Reference, David Cameron from FanGraphs, Greg Matthews from openWAR, Rob McQuown and Jonathan Judge from Baseball Prospectus to the show. With all the recent discussion about Wins Above Replacement statistics, we wanted to get people who create and maintain the statistics together to talk about how their respective stats are created and calculated. We talk about what replacement level is, positional adjustments, how to accurately portray confidence in the precision of the statistic.

Harry and Kendall look back at the World Series, discuss the Cy Young awards and the BBWAA vote has lined up with BP's pitching metrics over the past few years. Next up is a preview of some new pitching statistics that the Baseball Prospectus stats team is working on and why that's proven to be a challenge. Harry gives a look into how these statistics are imagined, designed, tested, and tweaked throughout the process.

This week Harry and Kendall talk to Jarrett Seidler from the Baseball Prospectus Prospects team about the cyclical nature of baseball in general, and analytics specifically. Harry and Kendall also take a closer look at how pitchers end up in the bullpen and examine their route to get there. For this exercise they looked at pitchers with a debut season of > 20 IP as a reliever, and fewer starter innings than reliever innings in that year and then went on to log > 75 IP as a starter in a subsequent season, with fewer reliever than starting innings. Check out the spreadsheet (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1B-zIHBTXAOnDeKi_4f2m4e1QgUR8OSZIBVagdwOcFow/edit#gid=0). *This Week I Learned: * Harry - A look into research done with Kate Morrison for Ben Lindbergh's Ringer piece about Dallas Keuchel and the Dodgers - https://www.theringer.com/mlb/2017/10/24/16533310/houston-astros-los-angeles-dodgers-dallas-keuchel-kryptonite Kendall - Is it possible that Major League Baseball is coming to Portland? - http://www.baseballamerica.com/columnists/expansion-trigger-realignment-longer-postseason/#IpHtEd8vb3JeJHOB.97

We start by talking about projection systems in general, then dive into 2017 PECOTA team projections. We look to see how adding in actual playing time affects the team totals. Then we talk about individual players that out-performed and under-performed their PECOTA projections. This Week I Learned: * Harry learns that "bullpenning" is a thing, sort of, maybe, kind of. (h/t Matt Trueblood (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=32960)) * Kendall learns to make adjustments in parenting, just like hitters like Mike Trout have had to make adjustments to high fastballs. (h/t to Jeff Sullivan (https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-history-of-the-adjustment-to-mike-trout/))

We sat down with Rob Arthur, Ben Diamond, Greg Matthews, and Travis Sawchik to talk about the MLB playoffs. We touched on playoff formats (past, present, and future?) and then moved on to talk about roster construction and optimization for the playoffs. After that, Harry and Kendall talk about the things they learned this week. Links: Alternate Reality Playoff Races by Ben Diamond Let’s Improve the Wild-Card Round by Travis Sawchik The Yankees Are Built to Bullpen the Wild Card Game by Travis Sawchik Baseball’s ‘Hot Hand’ Is Real by Rob Arthur and Greg Matthews TWIL Harry: Beans & Bagels You never know where you're going to meet up with Bill James TWIL Kendall: Tyler Flowers Good catcher or best catcher?

This week Harry and Kendall discuss pitcher similarity scores. Where did they come from? What are they? What can they be used for? And what might they evolve into. This week Kendall learned a little about Ted Williams, and Harry learned something from Neil deGrasse Tyson. Links: Pitcher similarity scores by Josh Kalk Clustering pitchers by similarity by Vince Gennaro Measuring Pitcher Similarity by Glenn Healey, Shiyuan Zhao and Dan Brooks Baseball Reference Similarity Score Definition Pitcher Similarity Scores 2.0 by Stephen Loftus Finding Comps for Other Signature Pitches by Jeff Sullivan Kendall's TWIL: Ted Williams, My Father Harry's TWIL: Baseball TweetTalk, with Neil deGrasse Tyson You can email Kendall and Harry at stolen_signs@baseballprospectus.com and follow them on Twitter @stolen_signs.

With the news of Shohei Ohtani's imminent posting from the NPB, this episode we talk with Sung Min Kim from the Sporting News about the posting system as well as a closer look at Ohtani. Harry and Kendall then discuss the precedence of two-way players in the Major Leagues and talk about what they've learned this week. Links: Frank HowardMLBAM Outs Above AverageHunter Greene's future is on the moundCan Cincinnati Reds prospect Hunter Greene be this smart and this good? Yes

This week Harry and Kendall welcome Dan Brooks from Brooks Baseball and Russell Carleton from Baseball Prospectus. We talk with Dan and Russell about how baseball relates to their professional field of study, psychology. Russell has a new book coming out, called "The Shift", which is available for pre-order. To steal a play from Russell's playbook, we command you to pre-order it.

We go through a rough outline of the history of sabermetrics. And we also want to ask for your help. We're sure we missed things. If you know of so key point in the history of sabermetrics, please help us add to our list. 

This is the first in a new recurring series called Stats and Storytellers. We're excited to welcome Jonah Keri as our first guest. Our conversation was wide-reaching and really interesting. We talked about Jonah's recent article about the Expos mascot, Youppi, getting ejected from a game back in 1989, touched on the stats behind why he thought Tim Raines deserved to be in the Hall of Fame. Jonah reflected on his time at BP (and elsewhere), and we had a great discussion about the ins and outs of writing about statistics. 

This week we talked to Rob Arthur of FiveThirtyEight and Jim Albert, professor of mathematics and statistics at Bowling Green State University about Rob's article Baseball’s ‘Hot Hand’ Is Real, co-authored by Greg Matthews assistant professor of statistics at Loyola University Chicago. We covered specifics of the article and the research behind it and also delved into how we can present statistical analysis to the general public in a way that's both rigorous and accessible.

On Episode 2 of Stolen Signs we briefly recap SaberSeminar 2017, answer a listener email about how to learn more about baseball stats, and we have a discussion about pitching metrics with Jonathan Judge of Baseball Prospectus and Neil Weinberg of FanGraphs. You can email Kendall and Harry at stolensigns@baseballprospectus.com and follow them on Twitter @stolensigns.

This is episode 1 of the Stolen Signs podcast, a new podcast from the stats team at Baseball Prospectus. Your hosts Kendall Guillemette and Harry Pavlidis introduce the show, themselves and talk to Jeff Long and Kate Morrison about their presentation at SaberSeminar 2017 about pitch selection, sequencing, and tunnels. You can email Kendall and Harry at stolensigns@baseballprospectus.com and follow them on Twitter @stolensigns.