Category: Sports News

Here are the lineups for the final game in Chicago. Let’s discuss.

For the Phillies:

For the Cubs:

I love JJ Wetherholt. You love JJ Wetherholt. Oli Marmol seems to love JJ Wetherholt, and, presumably his mom loves him, too. I’m not shy to admit that I’ve become enamored by a guy that I hope is in Cardinals red for a very long time – and immortalized in a red jacket long after he’s done playing. 

At 23 years old, he has come to St. Louis and been exactly as advertised. I would contend that his offense is not even all the way unlocked yet and he’s still running a 111 wRC+. That’s pretty good work if you can get it. Honestly, JJ Wetherholt has star written all over him as evidenced by the fact that he’s on pace for a clean little 5.8 WAR season as a rookie. If this holds, and yes I’m aware it’s officially still Early, that would rank him 16th all-time in fWAR as a rookie, right behind a gentleman named Jose Alberto Pujols, who ran a 6.1 fWAR in the Bobby Bonilla-aided 2001 campaign. (Seriously, thanks Bobby!)

I’ll detail why the defining feature of Wetherholt might just be his floor as a player, as strange as that seems, but I’d like to consider him from this angle and what it means for roster construction moving forward. Now, before you get your torches and pitchforks out, let me just say I think Wetherholt has more in the tank offensively and could see individual seasons where all goes extremely well for him and he’s on MVP ballots. I’ll give you a second to find hay for your pitchforks and water to safely extinguish your torches now.

I would contend that you need 2-3 transformational pieces to be in title contention. We can quibble about that, and I don’t want to get too lost in the weeds on that because every team is different. But, in baseball, it takes more than just transformation pieces. You need a depth of quality that leaves you with enough excellence to push through multiple rounds of the playoffs against the very best competition. I’m not sure the Cardinals currently have any transformational pieces in St. Louis (although there is at least one obvious candidate trying to change all our minds), but they certainly have some low floor pieces right now. In fact, we spent some time talking about what I’m calling the Crumbs of the Roster in our last Redbird Rundown episode. Give it a listen if that’s your thing – Apple and Spotify!

High-floor pieces are critical to building a championship contender, which is why I’m so enamored with thinking about JJ Wetherholt from this angle. The more of these players the Cardinals can lock in, the quicker this rebuild will be over and we can crack open the championship window and smell the alcohol-soaked locker rooms again. (Bad for the cleaning staff – great for the fans!)

So, what about his floor as a player has me so excited? Let’s start with his strike zone command. The eye test tells you he’s feels about 3-2 counts the way most normal people feel about bubble baths. It’s his comfy zone. When watching the games, it feels as though every one of his at bats goes to 3-2. According to research by Jeff Zimmerman of Fangraphs fame, strikeout rate is at its lowest at age 25 and walk rate peaks from ages 29-31. This is a clear indication that a player commands the strike zone better as he ages.

That bodes extremely well for Wetherholt who is already running a walk rate in the 82nd percentile and a strikeout rate in the 65th percentile early in his rookie season. (Yes, I know it’s early!) Obviously there will be variance as the season goes on, but this is not the first time Wetherholt has ever played baseball. He has a sterling reputation (and statsheet to back it up) from college and last season in the minors to let us know he knows what he’s doing at the plate.

What does this mean? Wetherholt is as sure a lock for a 23 year old rookie with 24 games played to be a high OBP offensive player as you’re going to find. At a bare minimum, that screams high floor like a yeti on the backside of the Himalayas. Even now, he’s a one man wrecking crew for pitch counts and it’s entirely possible he will get better at these skills as he ages. Even accounting for times that will surely vary as a rookie, that’s an exciting prospect! (See what I did there…ahh the old double entendre!)

The high OBP floor isn’t the only marble surface worth shouting about when it comes to Wetherholt, the defense has been even better than advertised so far. Obviously, there will be some variance in this rookie season, but thus far he’s in the 98th percentile for defensive value in the MLB. Watch the games. He’s making the routine play and the spectacular – that’s a great sign. Once again, the defensive age curves favor Wetherholt as defense typically peaks around 26 years old. 

Honestly, this all tracks. He played shortstop for a major collegiate program and was drafted at that position. The only scouting concerns I can dig up on his defense were a worry about his throwing arm at short. Add in two quarts of Masyn Winn and two cups of a position change to second base and – voila! – you’ve got a fix. He gives every appearance of having a shortstop’s range and instincts while playing second base.

On the bases, he has league average sprint speed but is currently in the 92nd percentile in run value. This tells us that despite average physical gifts for speed (now he’s certainly much faster than you or I), he’s a very smart baserunner. Add this in with all the other ingredients and now you can see why I’m looking at JJ Wetherholt and seeing gleaming marble floors from an upscale building.

Let me go further, even if he never maxes out his offensive capabilities, JJ Wetherholt is bound to be a very valuable piece for years to come. I feel confident in what we’re seeing as confirmation that he is and will continue to be a high-floor player at a minimum. I also believe that these kinds of players are exactly what a roster needs to be populated with to truly compete. 

That makes me excited – what about you? Let me know what you think in the comments, and, as always – thanks for reading!

Detroit Tigers (13-12) vs. Milwaukee Brewers (13-10)

Time/Place: 1:10 p.m., Comerica Park
SB Nation Site: Brew Crew Ball
Media: Detroit SportsNet, MLB.TV, Tigers Radio Network
Pitching Matchup: LHP Tarik Skubal (3-2, 2.08 ERA) vs. RHP Brandon Sproat (0-1, 6.88 ERA)

Right now, everybody’s talking about bullpens. Earlier this week, the Los Angeles Dodgers put newly signed closer Edwin Diaz on the injured list after a disastrous start to his LA career, as he undergoes surgery to remove loose bodies from his elbow. Over in Queens, their two new bullpen arms, Devin Williams and Luke Weaver, have been major contributors in what was heading into last night’s action a 12-game losing streak. And of course, here at Pinstripe Alley, there’s a good chance you’re already sick and tired of hearing about Camilo Doval, Jake Bird, and, to be honest, every reliever except Tim Hill, Fernando Cruz, and, somehow, Brent Headrick.

At this point, the narrative is pretty clear. For many years, the Yankees invested heavily into their bullpen, signing big name closers and top-shelf relievers to set up for Mariano Rivera (e.g., Tom Gordon, Kyle Farnsworth, Rafael Soriano), spending big money on closers following Rivera’s retirement (e.g., Andrew Miller, Aroldis Chapman), trading for closers to set up for other closers (e.g., Zack Britton, David Robertson, Tommy Kahnle), and signing top relievers on the free agent market to fill out the ‘pen (e.g. Adam Ottavino, Darren O’Day, Justin Wilson). They did this while developing a parade of bullpen arms that would be closers elsewhere, including Dellin Betances, Chad Green, Jonathan Loáisiga, and Michael King (before he became a starter, of course). And the Yankees — particularly during the Baby Bombera era, from 2017 to 2021 — saw major return on that investment: their 33.0 fWAR in that span ranks first, four runs ahead of the second-place Rays (whose 29.3 fWAR is artificially inflated by their liberal use of openers, who are officially classified as relievers) and well ahead of the third-place Dodgers.

Since 2021, however, the Yankees have taken a very different approach when it comes to building their bullpen. Rather than signing the top of the market players, they have opted to look in the bargain bin to find relievers — some of whom have worked out, and others who have not. The few top-level arms they do acquire have been brought in via trade, not signed as free agents, and are generally still arbitration-eligible. No matter how they’re acquired, however, when these relievers reach free agency, they have, for the most part, let them walk: since 2021, Aroldis Chapman, Chad Green, Wandy Peralta, Tommy Kahnle, Clay Holmes, Devin Williams, Luke Weaver, Jake Cousins, and Jonathan Loáisiga have all been allowed to leave in free agency, and Ian Hamilton, Scoff Effross, Mark Leiter Jr., Ron Marinaccio, Michael Tonkin, and more have been designated for assignment and released despite providing key innings. In fact, over the last few years, only Tim Hill, Ryan Yarbrough, and Paul Blackburn have been retained, and the latter two were brought back specifically because they also serve as rotation depth.

This philosophical shift has unsurprisingly generated some frustration among fans, especially when the bullpen has floundered (as it has so far this season). And I’m not going to argue with the idea that, maybe, just maybe, the team should have invested a tad more into the bullpen over the winter, instead of running out a bullpen that was clearly insufficient at the end of last season (no, Angel Chivilli and his career 6.18 ERA heading into the season doesn’t count as reinforcements, despite his young age) — there’s a sound logic to how they’ve treated the bullpen in recent years.

The traditional maxim has been that relievers are volatile, but in the mid-to-late 2010s, it seemed like that was no longer the case. While relievers did continue to rise and fall regularly, the race for spin rate on the fastball, and the apparent direct correlation between spin rate and bullpen success, meant that it was easier than ever to predict which relievers were a flash in the pan and which would continue to be dominant. And in that world, if you were absolutely certain which relievers were good, then it made sense to invest heavily into the bullpen and build a super-pen.

Once the sticky stuff crackdown occurred, however, relievers became more volatile once more, as the chase to increase spin rate… didn’t exactly stop, but wasn’t able to be as reliably intensified. This crackdown represents the turning point where the Yankees as an organization seem to have de-prioritized the bullpen in order to bolster the rotation: in that same span of time where they have not heavily pursued relievers in free agency, the Yankees have added a pair of top-of-the-rotation starters in Max Fried and Carlos Rodón, spent money on Marcus Stroman, and wooed Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Rōki Sasaki. There’s a clear logic to this strategy: it’s easier to rework a bullpen than it is to find a top starter in the middle of the season, and on the whole, top starters age more gracefully than top relievers (an ace who declines typically becomes a bottom-of-the-rotation starter, while a reliever who declines is usually destined for mop-up duty).

And while it can be annoying at times, this strategy has clearly worked for the Yankees. For all the handwringing about the bullpen this year, they are tied for seventh in baseball in fWAR with 0.9, fourth in ground ball percentage, and top-10 in FIP, xERA, and left on base percentage. Do I wish that Bednar didn’t require emotional support runners on the basepaths in order to lock in? Would I prefer to have a setup man who didn’t stress me out as much as Doval? Of course! But then again, as I look across the city to Queens, or to the other coast in LA…well, maybe the grass isn’t always greener.