Andrew Heaney

The Andrew Heaney breakout is in full swing with him posting a 10.3 K/9 and a 3.35 ERA. It was tough to find any support for a Heaney breakout going into this season with his injury history and subpar 2017 production.

Heaney’s health has been the number one concern since having Tommy John surgery early in 2016.

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Long has the relationship between pitcher performance and batted ball metrics been dubious. The Sabermetric community has a solid understanding of why, fundamentally, a pitcher is good or bad. Strikeouts are good. Walks are bad. Hits by pitch are also bad. Home runs allowed are especially bad. So on, so forth. And by no means are batted ball metrics useless. It’s how we know ground balls allowed are superior to fly balls allowed, for example.

The community had hoped, however, that more granular batted ball metrics would help us better explain some of the more nuanced elements of pitcher performance, including those related to luck, such as batting average on balls in play (BABIP) and the percentage of home runs per fly ball (HR/FB). Since their introduction to the public sphere in 2015, and even with the inclusion of more granular Statcast data in 2016, any relationships that might exist between the physics and outcomes for batted balls during an individual pitcher’s season are still poorly explained. The following table depicts the correlations between pitcher BABIP and various batted ball metrics, sorted by the strength of the relationship (all qualified seasons, 2007-17, n = 898):

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Today at the Stock Watch we look prospects in the Oakland, Toronto and Houston minor league systems.

Cavan Biggio, 2B, Blue Jays: As the son of Craig Biggio, Cavan’s name stuck out when he was selected in the fifth round of the 2016. He wasn’t really on many people’s radar, though, and was seen as more of a way for the Jays to keep the budget down so they could afford second rounder Bo Bichette (son of Dante Bichette). Now, he’s more than just a name. He’s a legitimate prospect leading the double-A Eastern League in homers and tying for the third overall in the entire minor leagues. Along with the pop, Biggio also has 25 walks in 36 games. His 39 strikeouts are an issue and could prevent him from hitting for average at higher levels where the pitching will pick apart the holes. Defensively, he’s stiff as a middle infielder but the power will play at first base or maybe even left field. He might eventually become a platoon or part-time player in The Show but that’s still a crazy increase in value from a year ago.

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In the span of two days, Jace Fry has gone from being an emerging lefty getting his first taste of some setup work to being firmly in the saves mix for the White Sox. On Saturday, Fry was used in the eighth inning with a two-run lead against the Rangers. Brought in to face Nomar Mazara, Jurickson Profar and Joey Gallo — a pair of lefties sandwiching a switch-hitter — and he came back for the ninth inning to handle left-handed Rougned Odor. Rick Renteria did not opt to give Fry a two-inning save, as he let Nate Jones handle right-handed Robinson Chirinos, even with lefty Ronald Guzman on deck.

On Sunday, the trio of Profar, Mazara and Gallo were due up in the ninth inning, and Renteria let Fry have an encore performance — this time with a 3-0 lead and a save at stake. Fry set the trio down in order, retiring the latter two with strikeouts. Through the first seven performances of his major league career, Fry has yet to allow a hit or a run, and over 8.1 innings, he has 12 strikeouts and two walks. While he has been highly adept at inducing whiffs, posting a 15.9 percent swinging strike rate, he has been even more impressive in his ability to freeze batters, inducing called strikes at a 24.3 percent rate.
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I’m back! (Did you know I was gone?)

You may recall I posted a small job last week. I’m still in the process of reviewing candidates. Since I received applications from about five people I want to work with, I’m trying to let some ideas percolate. No promises.

AGENDA

1. TDG Invitational
2. Weather Reports
3. Pitchers to Use and Abuse
4. SaberSim Says…
5. Counting to Six

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It appears the Giants have finally found their left fielder!

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All heroes don’t wear capes. pic.twitter.com/xWue9uJ3AB

— Cut4 (@Cut4) May 20, 2018

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5/21/18

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 19, the best baseball strategy game ever made – available NOW on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms! Go to ootpdevelopments.com to order now and save 10% with the code SLEEPER19!

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• @sporer – Host
• @justinmasonfwfb – Producer/Co-Host
• @jasoncollette – Co-Host

GET THE SLEEPER & THE BUST T-SHIRT FROM ROTOWEAR!

Biggest Ranking Disputes

Nick Higher:

• Miles Mikolas (5:55)
• Eduardo Rodriguez (14:20)
• Jake Arrieta (23:15)
• Brief Reynaldo Lopez mention (40:00)

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5/20/18

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 19, the best baseball strategy game ever made – available NOW on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms! Go to ootpdevelopments.com to order now and save 10% with the code SLEEPER19!

Follow us on Twitter

• @sporer – Host
• @justinmasonfwfb – Producer/Co-Host
• @jasoncollette – Co-Host

GET THE SLEEPER & THE BUST T-SHIRT FROM ROTOWEAR!

Notable Transactions/Rumors/Articles

• Howie Kendrick ruptures Achilles (3:00)
  • Juan Soto called up
• Rich Hill blister (12:45)
• Braves release Jose Bautista (14:28)
  • Austin Riley coming?

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The Cardinals-Phillies matchup yielded some interesting results on Saturday. Jordan Hicks – who was covered at length by Al Mechior on May 18th – hurled a scoreless seventh frame in a tie game, throwing 10-of-12 pitches for strikes and getting three ground ball outs. Tommy Hunter replaced Luis Garcia (who gave up a home run to Tyler O’Neil in the sixth) in the bottom of the inning. The first hitter to come to the plate – Tommy Pham – hit a slow dribbler to Scott Kingery at third base and he made an errant throw to first base to advance Pham to second base. Matt Carpenter was up next, doubling on the second pitch he saw to give the Cardinals a one-run lead. Hunter was able to escape the inning without giving up another run, but he started behind three-of-the-five hitters he faced and didn’t record a strikeout. With the Cardinals up a run, they turned to Greg Holland in the eighth to hold the lead. He was unable to oblige. After getting Carlos Santana and Aaron Altherr to ground out and strike out to start the frame, he yielded a walk, triple, and single to give the Phillies a lead they wouldn’t relinquish.

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