By ANDREW ZENNER I was looking through our data to determine whether there were any hitters that may be strong “shift candidates” that are shifted against infrequently. One name stood out in my findings: Houston Astros second baseman Jose Altuve. Let’s look at whether other elements of our data support…
By LINDSAY ZECK Rockies catcher Tony Wolters is hitting .134 so far this season—third worst of all catchers with at least 50 plate appearances, ahead of only Alex Avila and Roberto Pérez. So why haven’t the Rockies sent him down to the minors and brought up the hot-hitting Tom Murphy…
By WILL HOEFER Braves’ Executive Vice President and General Manager Alex Anthopoulos called somewhat of a harried press conference on Sunday morning, in which he informed the media present at SunTrust Park that Jose Bautista had been released. The impetus for that decision, Anthopoulos noted, was to give Johan Camargo…
By LINDSAY ZECK On Monday, Mark Simon posted a blog entry about rookie Harrison Bader, who has had one of the most notable defensive performances thus far with diving catches like this one. He has already saved the Cardinals seven runs this season—tied for the third most in the league—despite…
BY MARK SIMON Most of the names atop the Defensive Runs Saved leaderboard are recognizable at this point of the season. One of the exceptions may be St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Harrison Bader. Bader has channeled his best Jim Edmonds in the form of multiple diving catches this season. He’s…
Statcast is a really exciting product to have at our fingertips when analyzing players. It has given the public a whole new vocabulary with which we can talk about baseball. How many times did you hear the terms “spin rate,” “exit velocity,” or “launch angle” before a couple years ago?…
BY SPENCER HARRISON Sean Manaea is the owner of MLB’s only no-hitter this season. He is also the owner of the league’s second-lowest ERA (1.03), trailing only Johnny Cueto (0.84). Manaea is far from a slouch, but his current statline places him in company that most would consider aces. Sports…
BY ALEX VIGDERMAN While on a rehab assignment for another injury this past weekend, Byron Buxton fouled a ball off his toe and suffered a hairline fracture, sidelining him again in what is quickly shaping up to be a lost season. We all love keeping track of the trials and…
By MARK SIMON Just like with offensive statistics, defensive statistics take time for samples to build up. But there was one number from the early-season metrics that I wanted to at least look at a little more closely – Bryce Harper’s -5 Defensive Runs Saved. Harper had saved 28 runs…
Continuing our look at the most mistake-free players in baseball, we focus on the likes of Alex Gordon and A.J. Pollock.
