Not five miles an hour. Riding to his head, he hopping down first
with the lumpbonius face, and on the very next pitch he up and stole
second face with greatst be he wasn't born. He had the yes uniform.
Welcome to episode twenty of the Prospect B Sides Podcast. I am Nate Handy
and joining me as always tonight is Matthias von Rooker. And then we have
We're very happy to have a special guest Chris Clegg of the Dynasty Dugout Fellas.
How are we tonight? I'm doing good. I feel like I need
a nickname to go with with you guys. I could be the I guess
be technically the rookie today, right, I'm the rookie of the show.
So my little league nickname was Chaos. They called they called me chaos because
I would said I call Chaos on the base paths. But I never I
like that. That's good. Yeah, I like to keep Nan on his
toes with my change up to nickname every day. I like it. But
hey, Chris man, thank you for joining us. Honored. I know
you busy man. It's late on the East coast. I just I appreciate
that dude. Yeah. No, I appreciate you guys having me for sure,
and uh, I've got my second wave of energy, so we'll see
how late we make it. I know you guys record long, long episodes,
which is awesome, but um, definitely. I gotta say, Chris,
you look a lot better than I thought you might. I was the
amount of work and things that you've been putting time into this offseason. I
I kind of envisioned you on this screen here looking more like like like Saddam
Hussein coming out of the out of the hole. But you're in good shape,
man. We're making it out of the winter man, and we're almost
there. It's you have been, like just from someone who has done some
writing and done some lists and stuff that like, you have just been an
absolute animal this offseason. How many organizational top prospect lists did you write?
I did twenty six to the thirty you handled insane, dude, that is
insane. I think I helped out and try and then it two for you,
and I almost lost my mind doing two. I passed off the Orioles
to someone I trust with it, and the Cardinals somebody I trust with it.
So those are handled. The rest of them. Kudos, kudos to
you, my friend. That's uh, that's impressive. Much respect for that.
Yeah. I still feel like it wasn't enough though, because like some
of works, I only wrote like twenty players up just to I love it.
See see Clig, that's why you belong here. Man. You you
have gone through a lot of mutters this offseason. You you are one,
You are one of us. And he feels like he hasn't done enough.
You just put out a top one thousand prospects list and he still hasn't gone
deep enough. I love it. I love it. Clinton. I've almost
finished off the top one thousand dynasty, which is a little easier because I
have all the prospects already done. So it's like, yeah, at some
point, it's like, ah, this MLB crop is terrible. So like
I'm just gonna I hope they'll be better. I'm gonna, I'm gonna.
We're probably gonna ask you some questions about that Top one thousand and your process
there at some point here. But I wanted to touch on last week,
Chris. I don't know if you listened, not offended, if you didn't
last week's I apologize. What we did was we kind of piggybacked some questions
that we had from episode prior and some conversation in your Wonderful Dynasty dugout discord,
you know, how can you recommend a prospect might be a better bet
than a top one hundred prospect? Right, So we kind of long answered
that, and we set up some hypothetical trades that we might do that might
sort of buck consensus thought right, And part of that I did use your
ranking for some of these guys. So maybe even before we get into that,
like you make some lists and I know how this goes, then you
know part of it is then you get some people who are like, hey,
how could you do this? How could you not value this guy enough?
For this guy too much? And all that stuff? And then on
top of that you get some ask clowns like us who actually have a podcast
and get all critical. Right, So I don't know, Like Chris,
you take that stuff very well, and I hope that you understand that when
I do stuff like that, I am not questioning your reasons. We talked
about having reasons why you come to certain conclusions. I very much agree with
you much more than I disagree, But for me and I think Matt would
agree as well, like you learn way more when you disagree. I've learned
a lot from you about players that I have very different opinions on. I
haven't learned as much from you about players that we have the same opinion on,
and I value that. A friend of mine, Steve, once told
me, you know this, people get like a little bit heated about someone
going against their opinion and stuff, but like this is quote the the version
of arguing about like what your favorite dinosaur is. Like there's a lot of
different opinions, right, I mean right, wrong? What have you?
In the day Dynasty baseball, I very much can respect and disagree with opinions.
So thank you, yeah, thank you. Yeah. Well, no,
I think that I think that's a good point because I think that being
able to explain why you believe something about a player is important. Like a
lot of people can look on fangrafts and say, oh, he hit two
eighty seven or something, hit twenty two home runs, but like, there's
so much more to every prospect than that. So I think that being able
to explain like the reasoning behind and in doing so that allows you to learn.
I would say so when people question or when people ask you a question,
like, there's obviously players that we're not going to be familiar about,
Like we're we're pretty deep, deeply versed in the prospect world, but there's
still players out there that you know, you may not know. And so
this instance happened to like with me earlier in the twenty twenty three season,
and it was with Jefferson Rojas, who I've really grown to love, and
somebody asked me about Rojas, and I was like, to be frank,
like, I have no clue like anything about Rojas, and so I really
dug in a little bit. He's spent a game at the complex and was
gone, and so he's been in single A, so I was able to
watch a little more and then obviously like they're the Cubs single as in Myrtle
Beach and which was awesome. So I got to see them several times this
year to see Rojas, And so I think the best thing we can do
is like just be honest and like, okay, like we don't know everything
about every player, but we'll be willing to learn about them, like if
somebody questions, like, it's an opportunity to learn. And I think that
that that presents a great opportunity in them itself to just learn in a growing
knowledge of who these players are and to just go a little deeper. I
think that's really well said, and at the risk of and I don't mean
this at all, at the risk of sounding backhanded. From my experience with
you, Chris whenever it was when I first discovered some of your writing and
whatever. One thing that I've very much appreciated about you is that you are
always learning. You're always trying to get better at this. I appreciate the
heck out of your hustle and your game here like you and you get that
part of it. You get the part that you don't have all the answers.
I don't have all the answers, Matt to nobody, constantly trying to
find some, and I've been trying to focus and be better at this.
I don't know if I have When I get in on a player, like
I want to know better questions about the player, not so much you know,
have better answers for it, if that If that makes sense, and
I think you do that. You're one that has put the work in and
when you come to a conclusion, that's it. That's that's your conclusion,
and so be it what others may think, and I just I respect the
heck out of that. Yeah, I appreciate that. I'll level down on
that too. Putting together any ordinal or even tiered ranking is really hard,
Like you start to line these guys up. The skill sets are different,
they're in different organizations. There's so many different ways that you can slice it.
And I have really appreciated the way that you approach it with that humility
of like I'm going to share what I know, why I made a call,
and I'm open to changing my mind, like this is what I'm looking
for next, this is the next way that this player can develop, or
here's what's holding them back in my mind. And I think that that's a
really nice thing to see too. And we don't only see that in the
Dynasty world either. Right, people have their take and they're like, I'm
playing my flag and I'm not moving off this mountain. I'm going to defend
it at all costs. You can't tell me anything other is going to knock
you off that perch. And unless it's about Emmanuel Rodriguez, like you should
move off that take at some point if you get new information. So I've
really appreciated that about the way you approach those conversations to Chris, and you're
never trying to say you have all the answers. You're trying to say,
this is where they sit in my view of where things are in the landscape,
given these constraints of fantasy baseball, and I think that that's an approach
that we should all take more often. Yeah, that's I mean, it's
a tough learning like process to get to that point. I think it takes
like a lot of humility and being able to just like be honest, like
because I think when I first started out, like I wanted to like act
like I had all the answers, but you learn quickly like you don't,
You're pretty clueless, and I still have a lot to learn. I think
we all have a lot to learn every day, and so I think that
just being able to be open and honest is huge. And like you said,
I think the flag plant culture in this community is interesting and everybody wanting
to be first, and that when people do that, like they just become
so glued to that player, even when the player sucks, they just can't
move off of them because they've planned the flag and we were first on that
player, and then when they falter, it's like, okay, Like at
some point you can move off, It's okay. I think that's important to
like baseball's an never changing game and landscape, and to be able to like
adapt as players adapt and change too. I think that's that's highly important.
Yeah, you know, people want and I get it. You know,
there's an element of this way people want the answers to the test to get
and it's like, man, I don't have the answer to the test,
but I did some studying and this is what I this is what I got
sort of thing. So, Chris, last week we did these hypothetical trades,
right, Man, I didn't realize how popular and how big your dynasty
dugout discord is. I was the jerk who added everyone to vote in some
trade polls and someone's like, dude, there's like eight hundred people in here.
I can't believe. I'm like, there's eight hundred people in here,
Like, oh, man, I had no idea. So my apologies for
being that guy I want to do the discords for But it was nice.
We were wondering if like these hypothetical trades did sound as websited as we thought
they might sound or not. So we got about seventy of you of your
discord folks to vote in these polls. I just wanted to go over the
results real quick, mostly because Matt totally failed one and did not get his
trade accepted. But one of Matt's was he traded Walker Jenkins for Max Clark
or Emmanuel Rodriguez, one of the two. To be fair, I said,
I said, you could add an arm to the other side of the
side opposite Jenkins with this. But just considering that there appears to be for
a lot of people a big tier between Jenkins, Clark, Manuel Rodriguez.
Yeah, sixty nine percent of folks wanted Jenkins, nineteen percent wanted Emanuel Rodriguez,
and eleven percent wanted Clark. Chris, do you think, I know,
you've got a bazillion list out there, which is awesome. You do
them for different formats and all that stuff, and that's amazing because it is
very different, I think, But do you think that there is that big
of a gap between the value of Walker Jenkins and Max Clark sixty nine percent
to eleven percent sort of difference? Yeah, I mean it's a it's a
sizeable gap. I mean there's a gap in my rankings, but I'm not
sure that that gap is that big. You know, when we think about
the top prospects, like is it you know, we think about tiers and
all that sort of stuff. And while I do have Clark a little lower,
like, I think that there's that chance that Clark does take a big,
big step forward this year. I've spoken to Max Clark interviewed. He's
incredible hard worker. I mean he when I talked to himhen he was sixteen
years old, he was probably and still might be the best interview I've done.
Like incredible baseball mind, Like he just knows what he wants like and
he's going to put in the work to do it. So I believe in
Max Clark. If the power shows up, then yeah, he's one hundred
percent can be a top ten prospect in my opinion, just because I think
that's the one question mark, like kind of power does he ultimately get to.
He's a little smaller, I know, I think he's listed like six
to one. I'm not sure he's six to one with Jenkins, Like he's
every bit of six' four like Jenkins is a big bodied player and he's
a good athlete at that too. Jenkins run times if ticked up like Jenkins
is a is putting plus clock times up, which is pretty impressive for that
frame. And so from that standpoint, like, I just value Jenkins higher
at this point because I do believe that it could be a plus hit power
and speed profile and Clark I'm still questioning, like whether the power will be
above average or better, and I think he can get to that. I
do believe that. But with the present knowledge in the day, it's just
uh, a little more bullish on Jenkins. But no, I think that
gap is pretty sizable on that pole. Yeah, I was actually surprised.
I thought Emmanuel Rodriguez because from what I've gathered, the dugout is kind of
a pro Emmanuel Rodriguez group. Yeah, I'm not mistaken. I was surprised.
I thought everybody loved Rodriguez too. I mean, like I've been vocal
on him for a while a lot of people have, and so even in
the down quote down year, like I still have him as a top twenty
five guys. See, I've had this, Uh, I turned this game
on of his I've got the screen up right now, been up for several
days, and I'm just still waiting for him to swing the bats. So
I don't really have much of the take that is an issue. Yeah,
but I know that that is quite fine. Like we went over of Emmanuel
Rodriguez the next one, These are mine Now, people hated mine, Chris,
they hated my, but I was. I was also going for some
style points too. We were pretending like I was a play for a for
a B side license and submitting these hypothetical trades to a committee so that I
can maybe get a license to the top things. So style points is part
of this. But I traded away Drew Jones for Victor Barracoto and Joey Estes.
How insane do you think that might be? Because mean, eighty two
percent of folks voted for Jones and eighteen percent of folks wanted my side.
I think it's such a major make or break here for Jones. If he
struggles for the first two months of this season, he's gonna fall off really,
really hard. And Barracoto, like, he's pretty interesting. His data
actually surprised me a bit, Like when I'm dug in to the numbers and
I was like, dang, this was I was low on him, got
him as like a top two to fifty guy at this point. He's pretty
aggressive and like the contact rates are like fine, But he had a one
oh seven mone hour ninth percentile and supposedly he posted a max of one twenty
two. I'm not sure if that's a mystery or not. I don't know
if that was a mystery. That's that in the system, so like it's
out there, so I mean, he may be a thirty home run bad
that it's like two seventy. I think jones upside is obviously pretty significant,
but jones swing path is terrible. There's a lot of things going on that
just aren't pretty at all with Jones. And so while we're kind of hanging
on to the upside with him, it could be like he may fall one
hundred plus spots like two months in the year and maybe even further if things
don't get better. And Joey Estes, I mean, he's a he's a
solid arm. I think he's a high floor kind of arm, not flashy.
I mean, I'd still take Jones there, but I wouldn't be surprised
to say, like we're in July next year, and Jones could be sitting
like outside my top two hundred, Like I wouldn't be shocked in that at
all. And we did these the eve of Baseball America dropping their new top
one hundred. And I'm glad that I got these trades in then, because
two of my three got top fifty at the time consensus prospects and falling out
of favor at least at least there the next one, Claig, this is
part of why I wanted to have you on too, because Matt and I
have thrown some questions at a couple of players that I know you are quite
fond of, So I wanted to give you a chance here to let our
listeners understand how we might be way off the mark here. But he traded
away Carson Williams for Jet Williams and Isaac Coffee. But now the poll says
that this trade would have been rejected because fifty seven percent preferred Jet Williams over
Carson Williams. So I think Jet and Carson are pretty close to this point.
Like value Eise, I was pretty high on Carson, like really early
just I saw him and I was like, dang, this guy's got the
power and speed you want to see, and he excelled at lower levels because
he didn't see advanced breaking balls. And as he's kind of moved up,
like he's kind of got eaten up on sliders a lot. Like that's really
the struggles with Carson is the sliders and chase out his own, which is
interesting because the chase rate still has remained pretty low. But I've seen some
some ugly swings. He's just a premium athlete, like really just a plus
shortstop at that and he the power are speed combos there, like while the
home runs are fine, like you think he hit twenty two this year if
I'm not mistaken, but he spray's line, drives to all fields. He
it's all really hard. I think he had a one o eight ninth percentile.
So the evs are there with Carson Williams, but the contact is going
to have to improve there with Jet. It is kind of like the kind
of the opposite where Jet makes the most of his power. EV's are more
middling, but he uses his entire body well, he has speed. Ultimately,
the contact is just more advanced, Like Jet's going to make much more
contact. He's not going to chase out of his own as much, so
he's going to be on base as a higher clip. I think it's an
interesting argument because I do think they're pretty close at this point. If I'm
not mistaken, I think they're pretty close to my rankings. I don't have
that in front of me, but at this point, like I was pretty
high on Carson, I kind of pulled back a little bit on that and
the recent update to having like around fifty. I think both are around fifty
for me, and then you throw in Coffee, who seen a good bit
Coffee is an interesting arm. Talk a little bit bit him in the discord
the other day where he's one of the most unique outlier arms I've seen from
a release point standpoint. The movement profile like east to west is is really
interesting, and the just knock is the v low like he's eighty eight eighty
nine and he's not getting above ninety, which hurts him and my fears like
it hurts him as he moves up levels like he was dominating high hitters because
it was such a unique profile even though it was eighty eight eighty nine.
I mean, like the movement was just so insane on all the pitches and
like he's throwing stuff at hitters that they're not used to seeing, so like
they're used to seeing like these you know, pretty solid like high riding fastballs,
and then here we are a Coffee's doing unique things. So he's pretty
interesting to me. I like Coffee. I'm not like overly high on him,
but yeah, I mean I would. I guess like the trade could
potentially favor the Jet Coffee side, like just because I have those guys,
Carson and Jet pretty close. Carson was pushed fairly fast. Matt had referenced,
like the k's being the concern there is tricky, right, I mean,
like you said, you don't see certain level particularly secondaries, yeah,
until you start going. And a lot of it on that trade was that
I wanted to hype how good a base runner Jet is, like the way
that he steals bases. He has good speed, but he is a very
good base stealer and in Dynasty, like you can't underrate that, especially from
a guy with solid contact and get into more power than you might expect.
He's like one of those sort of underrated guys. When I dove into him
this offseason, I was like, man, he looks more like a top
twenty five prospect to me in a five x five dynasty, just because I
think the steels are real. I think he's going to play up the middle
somewhere and has enough power to not be a zero there like that is that's
gold. Yeah, I mean he's stile at forty five this year, like
highly efficient based steeler. I think certainly the upside is there for way more
steels than what Carson Williams brings. I think Carson probably is going to be
a consistent, like around twenty stolen based guy. But Jeed obviously showed that
he can be forty plus, which is is pretty huge there, and so
that's certainly something something to keep an eye on. While Carson may have the
edge of power, Jet certainly has the edge of speed and contact at this
point. So yeah, both young, both have been pushed aggressively, so
it'll be fun to watch them this year. I think definitely had to have
some Williams on Williams action there. Yeah. Yeah. The next one was
and that this more of like kind of an honorable mention one probably more of
just a straight up player of debate. But Kyle Teal versus Dalton Rushing,
it was pretty split fifty two percent deal forty eight Rushing. Matt and I
have both on this show questioned if we really believe in Teal's bat. I
know that you have spoken about Teal in the discord quite a bit. But
if you want, if you want to make an argument for Teal here,
go for it. I know you do have some interest and takes on it.
But if you don't want to, we can just pass to It's your
call. I mean, I certainly love Rushing's bat. I don't believe that
Rushing sticks behind the plate, which certainly changes like the out a little bit,
especially for like a fantasy landscape. You know, where does he land?
I guess that's the biggest question. Most likely a first base. He
has the bat to play first base. But when we're looking at the catcher
landscape, I think Teal's profile. He's one of the best defensive catchers in
the game already, and you know, just had the privilege to see him
for a short time in Greenville when he was here before he already was sent
to double A. But he's going to stick behind the plate long term.
He's got plus framing skills, he's got a plus arm, he's got ridiculous
pop times and the bat in hisself is very solid, and so I know
it was kind of concerning. Some people were questioning when you know, Baseball
America put out the evs for the top one hundred and and TiAl came in
with like a eighty four average EV. It is like eighty three to nine.
I think and be like, oh, he doesn't have any power,
and so you know, there's there's certainly aspects of that, like TiAl hit
two home runs so far, like in his professional career, he but he's
only played total games he's got when he's six games under his belt, and
not much you know obviously to write home about other than really good contact,
really good on base skills, steals a premium athlete, like he's a much
better athlete than rushing. He's going to steal bases too, which is interesting,
Like he's got good instincts, he runs well. I think that certainly
helps him stand out from the catcher standpoint that he can steal bases. And
I don't think he's going to be extraordinary power guy. But the evs like
to me suggests like a fifteen home run bat. You look at what he
did, like a large sample of his college evs with like metal bats,
you aggress it to like the typical what we see with like wood, and
I think fifteen's pretty reasonable. Steal bags, get on base, hit it
for a good average, he's going to play every year, like he's a
catcher that can stick behind play every day behind the dish, which is is
huge. We've seen those guys be extremely valuable for fantasy and so I think
just all those things combined for me, like kind of just give toeal that
edge when I just feel like rushing probably moves off the position long term,
even though rushing certainly has the the obps are probably similar actually, even though
we've seen some pretty gaudy obps from rushing too. But the power standpoint that
does go to rushing. But when you factor in the rest of stuff,
like I think that it's just it Teel. For me, it was just
an interesting combo because they both came out and had really great pro debuts after
being you know, well regarded prospects, but coming to the draft and then
both absolutely hit the ground running, and then it felt as if rushing had
been a bit forgotten. And Nate asked me what happened to Rushing this year,
and I was like, I mean, he had like a one forty
five WRC plusa like he was bad rose up levels, was showing the power,
was showing the VP, and you know he's a fine catcher, like
he's likely to move off. I think that's a fair take. But it
was just funny that Teal did sort of the same thing that the Rushing did,
albeit the shape of the production was different, and it just everybody's on
Teal after the almost the exact same thing happened with Rushing the year before,
and now they're valued differently, and so it was just more of a like,
are we hyping this guy a little too much much after a small sample
and another guy who we've got a bigger sample and maybe have more confidence in
the bat that we might want to put those two a little bit closer together.
And that was that was more my view there. Yeah, yeah,
both of them. I mean, Rushing was like the best pro debut after
the draft in his class. I mean, I won't say Teal was the
best pro debut, but he had a really solid debut too. But I
guess the biggest thing for me, like I was just more confident in Teal
like pre draft and so just who he is as a player, like just
a little more well versed. And I'd say, like I've seen Teal live
at this point, haven't seen rushing, but I'm just a little more confident
in who Teal is as a player versus rushing, Like we've seen some volatility,
like the fielding standpoint, like certainly factors in two to that. But
yeah, I think you're right. I think Rushing still probably deserve it to
be a top one hundred prospect. And I'm not sure I have him been
there. He's not far outside if not, but you're right, he might
have been just in the side. I think, yeah, yeah, I
think he was like ninety six if I'm not mistaken. So yeah, that
seems seems right. But yeah, it was interesting that like people kind of
moved off here, right. One forty six WRC plus four four OBP.
Still pretty impressive stuff there for rushing. And then my next one, Chris
I stuck. I swapped some catchers as well, but only sixteen percent of
folks liked my idea. Here I traded Harry Ford for Ivan Herrera and Caden
Dana. I think here is actually really underrated. I think Herrera could really
pop off this year. Like his numbers weren't like super flashy last year in
Triple A, but his data was extremely solid. He's been pretty good for
a couple of years. And yeah, I'm a MARINERDS fan and this was
my favorite one of Nate's. Yeah, I love Harry Ford. Ford is
undersized, though, and that kind of worries me. I seeing him more
this year in the AFL is kind of like, Okay, like I'm not
really sure like he's got the athleticism to play catcher, but did they move
him off? It's highly possible. I think that they could move him off.
And I think Herrera is just flowing into the radar for so long.
I do think he probably pops off this year. He's gonna should be the
starting catcher for the Cardinals. I mean, dude made really good contact last
year. Eighty four percent zone chased a twenty percent clip, Like that's just
really good numbers to combine the chase and the contact, And he hit the
ball absurdly hard on one of seven ninth percentile is really good for power,
so that he just hits it the other way too much and yeah, too
much, And there is some power in there. That one was a bit
different for me because I don't have any like glaring red flags with Harry Ford.
I don't hate him as a prospect or anything like that. I just
tend to think he's just generally a little bit overrated for my taste. And
I was just trying to be sneaky and cool with this one, you know.
Yeah, and here question for about you about Ford? For you,
what do you think his hummer output is gonna look like this year? So
he's probably gonna be in Arkansas. He hit what like sixteen last year in
pretty much a full season. What do you think he's going to do this
year? Well, I mean he's he's probably the power output from a home
run standpoints probably not gonna look great. And I think people are just gonna
jump off of them. But that seems like the nature of prospecting, like
they don't take into account like things like that ballpark being bad. You know.
Ford ford ninth percentile last year was one O three, which is right
at MLB average, So that to me is encouraging. That's actually more than
I would have guessed. Yeah. Yeah, And so he hit fifteen home
runs, but he had so many line drives I think, and even goes
to willing to go the other way that that probably affects the home run output.
The contact skills were fine, like seventy four percent. Overall chase rates
have been extremely good, like the like he was like sixteen percent chase,
which is crazy, but he's kind of the Emmanuel Rodriguez like he swung less
than forty percent of time, so that factors in. So I wouldn't be
shocked at all if Ford, you know, puts up a fifteen home run
season like again in Arkansas, maybe even a little less, and people kind
of like, oh crap, like this guy doesn't have power. Kind I
think that's what's gonna happen. I think he's gonna put up maybe ten eleven
because Arkansas is a tough part to hit in. Obviously the jumping level,
he's still young. I'm a believer long term. The athleticism is there.
I think he's a really good athlete. But I wonder if they start putting
him in the outfield a little bit more and have him learn a new position
as well and see some of the offensive numbers kind of fall, Like I
wonder if we're going to see a little bit of the Gabby Rodriguez or Gabby
Gonzalez thing as well. We're come up to double A, going to struggle
a little bit more. And so if you're really into Harry Ford long term,
this might just be a highlight of like, why don't you check in
in four months into the season next year and see if you can acquire him
for less than you can do right now. Yeah, the perceived value seems
like it's certainly going to drop, which is wild, but that's just the
nature of the game. So I'm I'm certainly on board with that idea.
And then Chris, I think Matt's going to need a friend for this last
one, and I think the way that your ranks go, you might be
that friend. I kicked him off of our team. I didn't let him
co manage this team with me anymore. But because he wanted to trade Brady
House for Brian Ramos, seventy of the voters thought Matt was crazy here.
So what do you think? No, I mean, I think it's closer
than people are willing to say. Brady House is just a popular name.
I actually have him back to back in the rankings, so that kind of
tells you where I'm at on. I do think we see a rebound from
House, but I also think that people just really underrate Brian Ramos. I
think he's a stellar bat. When I saw him in the AFL, his
like you can get a good idea of who he is on film, and
then you see him, You're like, dang, this guy is just so
physically mature, Like he's absolutely jacked a great athlete. Like to me,
Ramos may be up with the White Sox this year. They just don't have
anybody in that infield's it's worth anything, So it's possibility we see him just
the infield. Yeah that's true. That's just trying to be not but uh,
you know, so with House, like certainly he hasn't lived up to
expectations. He has been a well known name since he was like fourteen years
old on the showcase circuit. He had some injuries that affected him in twenty
twenty two, but the power still there. I mean he had a one
o seven mine hour ninth percentile. Ramos was right there. Ramos was at
one of six. So the powers there with both just comes down to the
contact. For both of them. Both are pretty aggressive. House chased a
thirty five percent clip, which is concerning. Ramos didn't chase at those kind
of levels, So I'm interested to see how it plays out for both.
The upside probably goes to House, but yeah, it's not crazy to say
that that Ramos is a dude and certainly a fair trade. I made the
argument House hit like over three hundred versus rities, where Ramos hit like two
thirty, and yeah, I think always kind of struggled versus rieties. But
it's Matt's trade. I'll just shut up and keep my nose out of it.
But thank you, thanks for thanks for your your opinions on those.
So Chris, you did it the top one thousand lists, which was awesome
for me because I got I took our B side list, our B side
selections and kind of see where you had them, and a good amount of
them made the list. So that made that made me happy. It made
me feel like maybe Matt and I aren't too crazy. But I'm curious through
your process. Now, your process was writing a bazillion organizational list and then
you made the top one thousand after that, right, yes, yes,
I wrote up every player first. Yeah, so I'm curious through that process
and all that mudding that you did. Were there some interesting guys to you
that perhaps maybe you didn't know a lot about or just really kind of got
your attention. Who might be some of like Chris Klegg's B sides, which
I know might be a little bit trickier because you do put lists out there
and do brank guys, how you value them? Who are some more interesting
guys that you came across. Mm, that's a good question. I was
gonna look at it kind of filter my sheep like the Risers, I guess
because there are certainly players You're like, dang, like I really didn't realize
like how good players were. Yeah, and that kind of leads to good
evaluation. You're like, Okay, like these guys are are certainly worthy to
be talked about. And it's not even a B side, But actually I
think it's because of you, Nate. You ranke Drew Romo really highly in
the Rockies right up, you did, And so I kind of went back
to the table on him, like he was in my top five hundred,
and so I was like, Okay, what is it the Like, why
am I like lower on this guy? And it kind of came to the
conclusion like okay, like certainly he fits in much higher south from like around
the two fifty range, which was a pretty good jump. There's a guy
in this draft class, Barrett Kent with the Angels, who I feel like
nobody talks about, but I'm like super in on Barrett Kent based on the
numbers and like the couple innings that he did throw that we could watch,
Like, dang, this guy's a pretty spectacular arm. He's got big stuff.
He's got a great starter's frame, like just a workhorse type. Leonardo
Balcazar with the Reds, somebody that kind of I've always had the name on
the radar, but like in the reevaluation is like okay, like he's he's
significantly better than I thought he was. And even though like him play a
whole lot, he was injured this year, It's like okay, like this
this guy needs to be moved up a sizable amount. There's definitely, you
know, the last several years doing trying to do some of this B side
stuff, Like injury is a big it's a big part of this, a
big part of where you know, some guys might get overlooked so to speak,
because yeah, yeah, well you enlighten me a little bit, because
I admittedly I know the name, but I don't know a ton about bells
of car. Yeah, he was. He's not very old, right,
No, he's young red short stop prospect and the system has been so good,
so it's kind of like overshadowed who he is as a player. But
he's smaller. He's like listed five ten one ninety so oh yeah, so
he's that size that ye know, Matt loves. He's nineteen though, and
I do think he's gotten a little bigger. I will say he's kind of
like a top of the order type profile that makes really strong contact. He
gets on pace of a high clip. The approach like very simple, like
he doesn't try to do a lot. He's gonna hit the ball where it's
pitch. He's showing really good gap power already, and he started to generate
a little bit more home run power too. Obviously like a hit tool first
type profile, but I do believe that he could be like a fifteen home
run bat. It also steals you fifteen bases. And while it's not like
a super sexy profile by any means. When he was doing his rehab for
his knee, he added ten pounds of like pure muscle like during the rehab,
which was huge. And so I think that he's one that we could
see a stock like really take off in twenty twenty four just because like kind
of the outside out of mind thing. And he showed at the complex level,
like really good skills in twenty twenty two, and he was off to
a really good start with single a Daytona before the injury. So I'm I'm
certainly heading my best with him kind of being a breakout type guy right on.
Nice sweet, Well, thank you for those that's yeah, that's nice.
The mutters look good on you, Chris. Well, so Matt I
shared with you you you looked at the our B side list with Clegg's ranks
next to him, right, mm hmm. All right, well I'll give
you the floor here. You got any questions for Chris. Any players you
want to talk about, Well, I think the one I wanted to talk
about is, or at least ask you about, is Caleb Durban. I
would have bet my four thousand dollars that was the player that I was to
ask you about first. Well, he when I saw the list, I
was like, okay, of course, a bunch of these guys aren't top
one thousand, probably wouldn't have been in my top one thousand either, but
Caleb Durbin definitely would have been. And so I wanted to just hear what
was it about his profile that you're rounding down on or what's what's your take
on Durban because I'm a big fan. Yeah, I think he's in pretty
unique player, as saw him in the AFL chat with him for a few
Fall Stars. He's an interesting build, like he's very short, very stocky
type bill and so like from that standpoint, like the athleticism is not very
advanced. Let's a I guess that's the word I'm looking for, but he
certainly plays above his means as far as like the when you look at him,
you wouldn't see a baseball player at all. And he's done a lot
of things well, like he actually moves well. And I say he's not
a great athlete, but he's stolen bases, like he's proved that he's put
up Let's see, I'm trying to do math here on the on the fly
at thirty six stolen bases between two levels last year. He makes really good
contact, I think at an eighty eight percent contact rate last year, which
is significant, Like that's that's huge, That's one of the best contact rates
there was. But ultimately, like twenty three year old in High A,
okay, like that was great. He jumped to double A and continued to
do that, which was really solid at two ninety one in double A last
year with a three sixty one OVP. He even hit some homers, which
was was big. I guess for me, the question kind of lies like
what kind of fantasy prospect are we looking at and what kind of power does
he get to like TV's are or not so great? So I think he's
probably like a sub ten home run bat. And I really do question the
ability of steal bases, and so like long term, it's with like he's
shown it, like he's shown he can steal, like with the body and
you know, the athleticism. I'm just not sure that he steals a ton
as a professional or like he's a professional excuse me, is an MLB player.
Then he does make it. And while he's shown the ability to be
pretty proficient based stealer, I mean he's fifteen out of sixteen in A High
A, twenty one A twenty eight in double A so really solid success rates
there. I'll be curious to see, like what that looks like as he
moves up and faces better catching. And I guess the biggest question is like
what kind of role does he feel? He feels like a potential like utility
bench bat, and I don't know where he finds consistent playing time. And
I guess that's the question marks around him that I have, even though I'm
rooting for him, like he's a Braves guy, Braves drafted him. I
hope that he succeeds, but I'm not sure that he's an everyday guy.
At the major QUL one probably half you know that top one thousand are and
so if they were like more than half, I guess that would be a
huge success. So yeah, I guess he has questions like anybody else,
and probably deserving to be on there, just maybe a missed opportunity to put
him on that list. I think the two things for me were running a
four point six percent krate at double A. Wow, nobody does that.
I mean, that's like Luris Ariaz did it at triple A, and one
other person I think in the last fifteen years did that at double A.
So showing that sort of contact rate. It really plays in thirty six steals
in half a season this year, because that was about maybe two thirds of
the season this year. That shows that he's really willing to run. I'm
with you, I don't know if he plays d well enough to be a
second baseman, even at the highest level. And there's not an impact bat.
He's never going to get to power in and so you're really going to
put that in the outfield. Like, so he's probably a utility guy.
But if he does stick around somewhere, I think that showing that aggressiveness that
he is willing to steal and he's pretty good at it, and that yeah,
his evs aren't good, but he's getting all of it. Like you
watched this guy swing and if that ball's on the inner third, he is
turning on it and putting in the air and running, you know. And
he's a guy that I'm super interested to follow. It'll be interesting to see
how he backs that up. He'll probably start next year at Somerset again,
and maybe he'll push triple A and they'll force his hands somewhere and maybe he's
just a trade guy too and gets to go play for one of those really
phenomenal organizations in Chicago that Nate loves so much. Back it off, Chris,
So, I don't know if the first episode that Matt and I did,
we started this thing off by doing some competitive b siding. Right,
We had a draft and we're gonna look at the percentage points of these players,
you know, a year later and whoever's guys became more popular win?
Right? So, and Thatt's just been writing a Durban roller coaster because he
drafted Durban, then he went off in the af FELL and then he was
admitted from your top one thousands. So it's just it's been an up and
down ride for ma here. But I wanted to ask you about first year
player Trevor Werner and essentially kind of grouping him with Jase Bobafron? Is that
how you say it? Is that, right, Bobafron? Yeah? I
think that's right. And like Matthew Etzel and Matt's guy c J. Kapis,
these are all four twenty twenty three draft guys, college guys who came
in and very much impressed Matt and I on the video, right, And
we've talked about some first year player draft stuff. How do you weigh this?
How do you balance this? Because I've spoke about I'm kind of struggling
a little bit. I want more and more. I want to push these
guys kind of up my first year player drafts. Like I said, it
seems like more and more every year. Trevor Warner was other than Langford most
impressive guy debut in my opinion, I don't know what do you what are
your thoughts on that? How do you how do you weigh that? The
samples are tough, like a small sample of a drafty. It's like,
okay, like this guy was a later pick, so you know, it
does make it a little bit harder to kind of you know, evaluate Werner
was awesome though, Like I've got to see a lot of him in Columbia.
Yeah, it was spectacular, dude, Like everything was just hard.
Man. It's it's such a low effort swing to and he just he it's
it's so hard with like such little effort, and he controls the barrel like
he's getting pitches all over the zone. And it was like, okay,
like this guy went from like pretty much a nobody, like he was like
a just a guy out of Texas A and m to he was he was
a two way guy for them for a little bit. Correct. Yeah,
yeah, So I don't know how. I don't know how long he's really
been a full time hitter. I have no idea. I don't follow with
Texas A and M. Yeah, I don't know. I think he could,
uh, he might just pop off and be like aitch all thirty home
run bat like pretty insane. Actually, so I'm a I'm rother in on
on Werner just from be able to get live looks at him like he was
just so impressive, and I think, right, he can move really quick.
So yeah, like Boba, he's different. Boba Fran's different because there
weren't any broadcasts so I've never seen him play, but the numbers and stuff
are very impressive. And I've had a friend of mine, Steve, who
follows preps very closely, hit me up after we talked about him on the
show and was like, yeah, man, back in the day, I
thought he was up there with all the big prep names of that class and
stuff like that. So like, I don't know. For me, I
struggle doing the first year of players. So I was like, dude,
I'm probably gonna draft Werner way before anybody else in my league will and I
think I'll be fine. We kind of referenced, like how do you pair
that up against a guy like Race Davis who really really struggled. Yeah,
that's tough. I mean, like you look and then you look back and
you're like, okay, So, like we have a SEC performer, And
I would say the SEC is like the premiere Conference for college, Like you're
facing the best competition like day and day out. And then you have Chase
Davis who was in the PAC twelve at Arizona, And you know, you
look at Davis and you're like, okay, Like the data was like super
good in college, Like the stuff he put up was ridiculous, Like he
had an awesome year, He made significant strides with contact, did not chase
at all. I mean, so then you look and you're like, okay,
So Davis one oh eight ninth percentile in college with metal a ninety one
seven average TV. You go to Werner he was a one oh six nine
and a ninety point seven average, So they're not far off from a power
standpoint, but Davis just had like significantly better contact. Werner was like a
seventy percent contact in eighty two percent zone in college, and then you go
to Chase Davis and it's like, okay, eighty percent and then eighty nine
percent in zone, which is nuts. But you see in pro ball like
a completely different thing, and so you have to just kind of wonder in
your mind, like what are they going to be? Like the game's just
a lot different. So yeah, it's it's not crazy, but you know,
if i'm I'm probably going to pass on Check Davison. Yeah, depending
on where he goes, Like, I think I take him in like the
twenties range, twenty thirties ranges, bet on him where you can just get
so much cheaper, which is wild. So yeah, it's nice. Like
I think Warner's just a guy. Yeah, it's tricky, And then you
know, talk about stuff on a podcast and maybe some of my league mates
catch wind of some events. So then then I got to be like,
well, maybe I do got to take him twenty before one of these other
jerks. Does you know? One thing that is that we talked about before
Nate about A and M guys, is that Texas A and M their collegiate
approach is kind of like what I preach, which is don't swing the bat,
and that's like a programmatic thing for them, and he doesn't want him
to swing the bat. How does that make any sense? It's better when
you don't swing. It's one of those counterintuitive things, but that's that's what
all the math says, and I kind of trust the math, and I
wonder It's one thing that we've talked about, is there might be a study
there looking at A and M bats or other bats that kind of have that
approach in college. How much does that approach change when they come to pro
ball, where you've got a new organization telling you different things. The players
are kind of doing it more for themselves in their career and seeing which guys
change that approach and up their chase or up their swing percentages in pro ball
from a program like AMM, which is pretty notorious for very low swing rates.
And it's something that I'm curious about and wonder. I really don't know
which way it plays into their development. Does it help, does it prepare
them better for facing minor league pitching or is it setting them up for a
harder learning curve? I don't know. Yeah, it's an interesting thing to
think about, for sure, And every org is so different. Every college
is so different. It's like sometimes like players have to be in the right
place the right time to succeed, which is interesting to think about. But
some guys are going to be better suited for better orgs and better teams.
But you have to wonder like those guys that like notoriously low swing rates like
schools like you mentioned, Like with Werner, I mean, he swung.
See his swing rate last year in college it was forty percent, so that's
just pretty conservative overall. And then swing rate professionally, curious if it jumped
or if it's gonna be like a egg. We're talking like this was the
same season. Basically, it's like how long how the swing rate was identical?
It was forty and a half percent for both. But the interesting thing,
Yeah, but the contact ra jumped. Like I mentioned, it was
like seventy percent overall, it was seventy nine percent pro ball, which is
just nuts. So yeah, I mean that's uh, just pretty pretty spectacular
what Werner did as a pro. And I'm curious if it can stick.
He's good. I think he's gonna get an aggressive push. He may be
in double A to begin next year. I wouldn't be shocked not to probably
probably in High A and then Double A by mid season. But I forget
that Columbia single A. I'm used to Greenville be in High A, and
so Columbia's is low A. So yeah, he'll be uh. I think
he's gonna be pushed aggressively and hopefully he can succeed. It's interesting things to
think about during first year player drafts. Chris, I had noticed that you
had, well, I mean, the middle of the top one thousand list
is fairly high, right, but you had Rangers prospect Marcos Torres five O
three on your list. He was my Ranger bat beside selection this year,
in part because I was told that when I watched him, he had an
outlier trait and that I would blatantly see what the outlier trait was. And
Chris, I did not see it. I did not know. I don't
know what the outlier trait was, but I just saw I saw him on
your list here, and I was wondering if maybe you could help me,
if you had any idea what that outlier trait might be. I have absolutely
no clue what. Okay, I had wondered. I had wandered, and
I granted a limited amount of broadcast to see. But I had wondered if
it was like Chase trade stuff, because I don't know if I saw him
we're gonna pitch outside of his south But they said you would see it by
watching, Like, I don't know, it feels like it'd be something that
was outlier mechanical. I mean, like, I don't see I don't see
anything he has. When we had talked about him, he has kind of
the there's a little bit of the sort of like like the the Japanese guys
that will come over lefties that were kind of like be leaning towards first base
as they start to swing, you know, start moving in the direction.
He's got a bit of that to him. But I didn't I didn't think
that that was the outlier trait that I was supposed to be looking for.
No. Now, I'm just watching a video of him mashing opposite field home
run at the complex right now. Like he's a pretty unique profile and the
power speed. Yeah, he's small, a little bit of a smaller.
He looks smaller on film and he's looked at six three, So I don't
I don't really know, like yeah, and he was just he was a
guy that I just sort of had brought up, like I wanna watch this
guy and see what this is about. I ain't like, I ain't advised
and the preaching. Then we go out and get a bunch of shares at
this juncture. But yeah, yeah, certainly I think he's like a watch
guy. Like okay, like with the with the ranking of him, it's
like, okay, let's watch this guy closely, see what he does in
you know, full season ball, and then we can kind of go from
there. It's like one of those things where you're like be ready to jump
on him if he does continue the success going into you know, full season.
And we saw a little bit of just ten games and it wasn't great.
It was ten games, So I'm not pretty much stock into that.
Yeah, And you know, like I've I've said before here too, like
I just kind of pride myself on if anything, this podcast is just going
to be a little bit informational and give me some information about some players that
maybe we don't hear a lot about other places. But there was a Matt
and I think Matt we both came together on Alan Castro. Right, I
want to ask you about Alan Castro Chris, because I know that you have
seen a good amount of him, but I think the generic take for Matt
and I was like, this, this is a guy who just seems maybe
a bit undersold, maybe in that like all numbers or certain traits to point
at as being like super outlier, but just a guy that on the tape
at least to me, just impresses. It's just a very solid kind of
all around like might be a major leader, a sort of prospect. Yeah.
I've said that from like the first day I saw them, And I
first saw him with Salem when they were in Colombia, so when he was
still in in single A and I was like, dang, why is nobody
talking about this guy? And not even people like in the Red Sox circles
really talking about him at all either, And he just kind of stood out
to me as like a pretty impressive athlete in the field with the bat,
like he doesn't even though he doesn't like he doesn't like grade out or get
a bunch of speed stuff, Like he's athletically he seems like you said,
very yeah, yeah, And I mean he's a switch hitter, like he
likes to swing us from both sides too. I mean he was a fun
one to watch. Yeah, and the numbers don't look great like as a
right handed bat last year, but I still really like the swing, Like
obviously like the swing's more natural from the left side. He looks better than
the left and shows. But I thought he's fine right handed, just hasn't
really shown h like numbers wise. But I think he's a pretty good player.
And I don't think anybody's talking about him enough. Salem's a notoriously like
pitcher friendly park and he saw that with a lot of guys they've come up,
and you know, it wasn't like a huge power boost for Castro when
he jumped to Greenville, and Greenville is like kind of a neutral park,
but like he sprays a lot of balls in the gap, Like he had
thirty one doubles last year in one hundred and twelve game, which is solid.
He had four triples, seven home runs. He can steal bases,
he's got a pretty good eye at the plate, and it's going to take
a walk. I don't know. I just I really believe that Castro might
just be a he profiles like as a fourth outfield type that's a major leaguer
and that's kind of what we're looking for with these guys. And so,
yeah, Castro's very underrated, a guy like a lot. Yeah, I
think that's where we both landed on him as like we're not I'm sure that
it all rounds up into a regular, but guy looks like he's a major
leaguer on that trajectory. He was a fun one to watch. Yeah.
And then because you get out to these games and I saw you put Hayden
Mowens eight thirteen on your list and you talk to people, there wasn't there
wasn't a lot on video. I think two outings from Mowens. And we
had talked about how he was a very highly touted prep arm I think he
was well number two, perfect game, left handed picture of that class.
Yeah, but I was just curious if you if you've heard any talk about
about Mowens here, who's rostered in zero percent of leagues but a major list
and was super impressive Matt and I in the very short bit that we got
to watch with him. Yeah, and there's obviously not a lot, Like
you said, it's a very small pro sample. He got a couple three
innings in Salem and a couple of the complex. But he's one that I
shouldn't struck everybody out. Yeah. Yeah, it was like a I think
you're right. He literally struck out like every patter that he faced pretty much.
It was a fifty per kraid and single hay and sixty three at the
complex. Stupid. Yeah. Yeah. The reports have been kind of mixed
because there's not been a lot on him. There's not been he hasn't been
seeing a lot, and you know, I do think that he's probably in
Greenville this year. So he's one that I should get a lot of looks
at. Some of the guys with socks prospects think he's a reliever. I'm
not sure. I'll be interested to see, like can he actually throw innings?
Like do they actually let him start? I think that he could.
We'll see. Obviously, the injuries have been a major issue for him,
and the durability will be something that he needs to prove. The body's interesting.
He's not like a huge guy, doesn't have a ton of projectability,
but he's like low mid nineties fastball. He's got the slider that's in the
load to mid eighties that's kind of a sweeper shape. It was a really
good pitch in college and obviously probably what he's getting most of his strikeouts on
the small sample. He does slow to change up, but not often.
So I'm curious to see, like where do they go with him next year?
Like do they let him start? Do they build him up in the
bullpen? Yeah, he's an interesting one to watch for me, just because
I think that there's some intriguing stuff here. It's just like, what's the
role and like what's the health look like? Could you do me a favor
and if you get any good nuggets on him, will you just DM me
and hit me up at first? All right? Sweet? Fantastic. The
one little the one little bit that we got to see of him on video,
it really looked like he had one of those outlier release point and movement
profile combinations that, especially considering for a lefty sitting in the low nineties,
like that could really really play. And that gets me to the next one
I wanted to ask about. We have chatted a little bit about will Dion
earlier, and he's another one kind of undersized lefty who at least up to
this point, has performed exceptionally well in the minor leagues, but has velocity
concerns, has some questions about projectability and can he have the kind of innings
built up and will Cleveland even let him continue to start as he rises up.
But he's one that I'm pretty curious about, just both because his release
point in his sort of Kershawian delivery, it's definitely given guys hard looks even
though he's not running the fastball up there at any any impressive velocities. And
the rest of his portfolio to me looks like it's a you know, four
or five with maybe upside for more as a as a starter in the major
leagues. And so he's one that I'm really interested. You ranked pretty aggressively,
i think compared to a lot of other people, and it's one that
I still think he's flying a bit under the radar but reminds me a little
bit of Mulleins in a lot of ways. Yeah, and he's quite interesting,
just a unique profile. It's like Clayton Kershall like literally made up over
in the delivery just to a t. It's deceptive. The fastball sits eighty
eight, like that's the concern. It's like, okay, like how does
this play? And it's played like as he's moved up. It's just kept
playing, which is interesting. He's still striking guys out at solid clips.
It's a really nasty curveball. It's a solid change up, and the change
up I think this made really good progress. And you know, I don't
know. He's quite interesting, like an enigma in a sense that like I
just really question, like can the profile work? And it's just keeps working
over and over and over again. He's just thrown innings, he gets out,
he gets strikeouts, he commands it well. So yeah, I hope
that we'll see him in Triple A this year. He'll be twenty four at
the start of the season, so it feels like the Triple A is the
next proving grounds for him and to see, like, is this guy a
major league arm And you know, he certainly I think makes the majors in
a starter's role. I don't know. He's just really unique and like an
outlier profile in that sense. One of the things that I've read recently from
a guy I think he did some writing at fangrass a while back, Eli
Ben Perratt, I think say his name is. He wrote on his substack
a while back about how velocity doesn't matter. Yeah, that's hyperbole, and
he, I think was using it to make a broader point. But that
point, I think was a really interesting one, that velocity really is sort
of the smallest piece of your overall profile, and yet we probably placed too
much emphasis on it. And guys like Will Dionn are a real interesting test
case for that, where he's saying a prochangle and IVB are actually far more
important towards can your fastball play in the minors or in the majors, And
it's not so much about the velocity, it's all the other components, your
extension, your horizontal proch angle, your vertical approchangle, and of course your
and doce vertical break. And dion is kind of an example of that that
I'm super curious and personally and I've fallen for this before. I was really
in on Tommy Romero a couple of years ago, who's another one of these
guys that dominated Double A, dominated Triple A with one of these low,
low approach angle, super high spin fastballs, and then it ticked. The
stuff ticked back just slightly, and he got lit up and is sort of
a non entity now. And so I think the tightrope is there, but
I'm still really interested in these kinds of guys and can they make it work
at velocity bands that we don't usually see. Yeah, I mean, it's
be interesting to see, like how this profile does play. It's just so
rare to see sub ninety starters like work and maybe he's an outlier. There's
always outlier cases, and in Dion's case, he'd be an outlier in a
lot of ways of being a very undersized tarter, having a sub ninety mile
hour fastball, like all those things. But man, it's hard to argue
against what he's done so far to this point in his career. Aesthetically,
I love that motion. It's cool. Yeah, yeah, it's very unique.
And it's just literally Matt's number one pitching selection in our B side draft.
Kaiwai Tang, Chris, you put him at age sixty one. I
find Kaiwaitang to be absolutely fascinating. And this you know, we're playing dynasty,
right, you're trying to evaluate and value players, but this there's also
like a poker aspect to it, and you're playing your opponents too, right,
So like, riddle me this, Chris, why why is Kaiwai Tang
only rostered in six percent of leagues. When fantasy owners love strikeouts, will
totally ignore profile killing walk rates to chase strikeouts. Tang has led the minor
leagues and strikeouts for the last three years. You can't use walks as a
knock, in my opinion, if you want to be consistent, you general
ten Stapper dune that I like to argue against, and you can't really velocity.
He doesn't throw that soft. He's like one mile per hour softer than
average my major league fasta. So like, what what what do you think
here? Why is Tang not getting dynasty love that that so many other profiles
like this seem to get. What do you think? It's a good question.
I mean, he does do a lot of things. Well, I
really think that age is probably a factor and right or wrong, Like I
think people are just going to look at you and say, oh, he
was twenty four, he's twenty five now, and he was in double and
triple A at twenty four, and then naturally, like it's just going to
be you know, people are going to write him off, and you know,
the profile like it's intrigued me more and more. Kind of like the
more I've looked into who he is as a pitcher, and you're right.
You look at the arsenal like he's got pitches across the board, like he
throws a sinker and a four seamer. He throws a cutter. The fast
I mean the for seam, like is ninety two, ninety three sinkers right
in that range as well. So like average MLB four seamer last year was
ninety four and yeah, not far off. And that includes relievers too.
Maybe this is incorrect to me. Maybe round down a smidge for starters.
It's about average velocity. Yeah, he's right. I wonder if the I
wonder if the body has something to do with it too. My man looks
like he loves candy bars and cheeseburgers. That makes me like him even more.
I don't he's listed at two sixty. I wonder if it might be
a little higher. We'll see, but yeah, yeah, I mean,
you look, it's a it's I don't know, Like the movement profile is
interesting, Like it's a really low IVB fastball. It does get some horizontal
movement to the vertical approach angle is it's pretty solid. But he doesn't miss
bats at all with the fastball and what he does with the cutter and the
slider, and so one thing that I was saying is he's got six pitches
that he throws more than like eight percent of the time. And I was
like, you should drop the four seamer. He doesn't. It's not like
he's commanding that any better than his other fastball. And if he throws fewer
of pitches, if that helps him tighten up his command even a little bit,
why not. I mean, I was like, drop the curveball,
drop the four seing fastball, and eat with your cutter slider, two seam
combo and then mix in a change up every now and then, Like I
think that four pitch mix is a heavy ground ball, gets a decent amount
of strikeout kind of play, and if he gets any kind of run.
In San Francisco, I was like, man, this guy's gonna go from
six percent to sixty percent owned pretty quickly. You know, there are lots
of warts still, and I'm the first to complain about a guy's command as
something that's going to hold them back. But he's just one that I was
like, the guy literally led the minor leagues in strikeouts the past three years.
Like buy a decent amount, and that's hard to do, Like you
have to have some skills to do that. And he's a knocking on the
door now, So he's an interesting one to me. Yeah, I mean
he is interesting. He's got to throw more strikes, like that's really the
biggest thing. So, I mean, I don't know. It's an interestingtioning
pro to watch. If you had no access to data, stats, anything,
you show up at the field and you figure out, can you spot
who's the best player on the field? And what's your process about going to
do that? So Chris posing that question to you, if you're ignoring the
data side, which I know you're well versed in and dive into, and
you just show up at the yard, who are you looking at? Like
what what's sort of the mental model that you're using to say that's the best
player on this field? Yeah, And I try to do that. I
try to get like a clean slate, like if it's a new player,
like I haven't seen live. That's hard because you have so many biases.
But I try to, Like every time there's a new team in town,
like I'll try to go in like with a clean bias of like or like
no bias. I guess of who these guys are. But it's interesting because,
like I'll typically I'm on the field pre game, so I typically try
to like just kind of see what they're doing, like close up their size,
like the kind of things, so I want to see, like what
kind of person are they that they care. There's there's always guys that just
don't give a rip that are out there, which is crazy, Like you
see the Anthony Rendole and stuff like, which is wild. And there's more
players out there like that that you know, just don't enjoy the game as
much. But you can always see the guys that enjoy the game just being
out there in warm ups like they taking it seriously but also having a good
time all those things, looking at the projectability of like the frames and all
that stuff. Like you know, I mean, there's always the outliers,
but I'm like five eight and a half. So like when when you see
guys that are shorter than you and smaller than you, it's like, okay,
like I'm not sure how this works. Like you know, Jet Williams
is an outlier. I guess he's tiny, but you know, you have
like the Chase Madrath who is shorter than me, but he's two hundred and
ten pounds. It's like, okay, like spotty just isn't gonna work,
I don't think. But they're like you said, there's always the rare exception.
So like I want to look at that stuff pre game, like take
notes and then like kind of watch him in the dugout too, like during
the game, like you can certainly see like leadership qualities and all that stuff.
So I'm kind of watching some of that, like what the players are
doing, like how they're interacting, Like what do they do when they strike
out, like they just pissed off or they going in there and looking at
tape and trying to learn and be better, and like those guys I want
to bet on. But yeah, from like a I guess performance standpoint,
like pitchers obviously, you know you're watching like I'm watching how they command it.
You know, how are they sequencing the pitches? You know, what
are what's the velocity like, and then kind of the the others like what's
the stuff like, you know, how does it play? How are they
actually and are they actually using it like in a way that's useful, like
in a sequence way, and so you know but then you go run to
the issues of like there's orgs that are just making guys do certain things.
Like I saw above a Chandler like three times this year, and he the
pirates made him throw a slider the second pitch of every bat, Like it's
just stupid stuff like that. This obviously like you pick up on, but
like the org was making him do that just to try to develop that pitch
further. It's like teams knew that was coming, so like then he's probably
trying to like finagle to pitch a little bit to like make sure like he's
not you know, he doesn't want to leave that pitch in this zone when
they know it's coming. So it certainly messes with the data and stuff.
And there's probably a lot more instances like that than than we even know.
So like if you can pick up on that or if you know them at
the insight, then that's great. But it I think that that's where just
the stat line stuff just becomes so useless when it's like, you know,
like all these guys are just working on so many things and so like you
have to be like so aware of what's going on, and it's just there's
so many things to pick up on. It's kind of wild. So I
think I'm ranning probably can keep randing more about that, but yeah, no,
yeah, I totally agree. And that's why I like to watch binge,
watch pictures and try to highlight some of those things that I pick up
on and stuff when I've done like the picture of you stuff, because there
is some guys are doing a lot of that, I think, or or
you're wondering if they are. And then there's there's some that's like, Okay,
you're not doing any of that, you're not pitching to any sort of
development here at all. Then for us trying to decipher which is which,
and I think that that plays especially with with pictures, Yeah for sure.
Yeah. I mean batters are a different beast because like so many different things
can work. Like I don't think there's like one like everybody wants to like
critique swings, but like there's not one right or wrong way to do it.
You know, as long as the barrels, you know, through the
song, your hands are in the right place, Like you can look a
million different ways and obviously work out. So so everybody crap, go ahead,
No, yeah, I'll definitely have my bias though with some hitters,
like if you do certain things, it's like I don't really want to make
bets on you, yeah, just because I've seen that that not work all
that great as you get to better pictures. But yeah, but your point,
like a lot of different things can work. Yeah, and that's just
the game of baseball, which is great. But like the chase, the
louder stuff with everybody like hate on. So I don't understand, like it's
it's just a short follow through. It's like his barrels in the zone so
long he's on plane consistently. Like it's just like seems so un informous to
look at and say his swing sucks, Like yeah, I don't understand that
narrative, to be honest. Yeah, it's also funny too with him in
particular, he only does that when he makes solid contact, Like you say,
him swinging this and it's a normal swing because like he's not stopping it
early. It's not taking anything away from his swing. It's just that the
impact of the ball on the bat like that is transferring all that energy and
so he can stop it short and just start running. You know. It's
like, yeah, it's a fine follow through. I've never understood that one
either, but I do think there's some good stuff that you can pick up
on though, you know, things that I was not very good. I
always tell meate like, I'm I was only good because I was bad.
I kept failing and learning, and I was I was one of those kids
who was like, I'm going to keep working out. I loved practice,
yeah, because I liked the getting better part, but it also meant that,
like my swing wasn't very good, and so I had all these things
that I was always working on. And you have enough coaches and scouts and
everybody tell you like this is wrong, this is wrong, you need to
do this better. You start to see those things in other people. And
it's kind of why they say, like Barry Bonds terrible hitting coach, because
he's like, I'm fifty five and I'm a better hitter than you, all
right now for that stint with the Marlins, and you kind of need somebody
who was like your Steven Votes, who was like, he wasn't a good
hitter, but he knew a lot about the game. And bringing that to
kind of analysis and spotting those mechanical flaws. I think that's a little bit
of what we're trying to highlight with some of the b siders. Yeah,
for sure. Where'd I played at Washington State? Oh nice, Yeah,
that's that's what that guy sat when I was bringing up some deep first year
player bats and I had like two Washington Huskies, had to hit on them
a little bit. Yeah. Yeah, But we got to play against a
lot of like pretty good players, you know. We like played against Garrett
Cole, Trevor Bauer, and yeah, that's got Trevor Bauer and Garrett Cole's
head mounted on the wall of his man cave because I got I got hits
off both of them at least. But yeah, Trevor Bower never got me
out. That's my that's my claim to fame there. Good one for one,
two walks, two walks, a couple steals. You got to play
against the pretty good guys and it was always fun the things you know,
like you say, Chris, we knew all these guys and their stats,
and then they show up at the field and then you see how it shows
up. And Trevor Bower is his own thing just as a as a person,
but watching him do things differently as a pitcher, you're like, oh,
that's why this sort of unassuming, non athletic looking six foot maybe Pitcher
is out there throwing one hundred and one on the mound because he's sort of
willing to do something totally different to anybody else, and he was I thought
the better picture of the two in college at least it was. Yeah,
they were nasty. I watched that team pretty closely, just because especially the
College World Series because I'm a South Carolina guy and obviously played in the final
that year. So man, they were. I still can't believe soccer On
to beat them with doing that. Colon Bauer, the Chris thank you man,
man, you're welcome, thanks for joining us. Yeah, of course
glad to do. Let's we'll let you get to bet unless you want to
stick around more. I just saw it over midnight, so yeah, there's
we want to hit any quick hits, I'm open to it, or we
can we can wrap it up. I just have some real, real quick
questions for you. Just got to answer one word response, elaborate if you
want, but hitter's or pictures hitters? Come on, man, Yeah all
right? Would you rather your young hitting prospects be aggressive hitters or passive hitters,
aggressive talking about I don't like it. I don't want to like aggressive
or too passive. I don't want I don't want to like a thirty five
percent wing right, but I don't want a fifty right. Read Von Scooter
or Trevor McDonald. It's a Van Scotter. Oh yeah, you math,
Chris, Chris Man. This is great. Thank you. Anyone who's listening
to this show listens to you and reads you. But if I don't know
if you want to tell folks what you got going on or whatever, but
if you do go for it, well you find all the work at the
times to dugout dot com, come hang out in the discord with us in
chat baseball all day. It's uh, literally a great place. So discord
discord is great and it's a What I appreciate, Chris, is that it's
an environment where we do have disagreements and we do learn from each other,
and it's it's very civil and educational and fun. Yeah, we all got
some player that's that we like to talk about a little bit more. And
uh, folks like to give us some crap for that, and I appreciate
that. But thank you, Chris. You have a good night, my
man. Yeah, you too. Appreciate you guys, all right later,
all right, Matt, So that was that was awesome. That was great.
Appreciate Chris coming on that. He's good, people's he's smart. He
he does the work, as he said, he's good. Yeah, much
respect there. I don't know what we're gonna talk about next week, Matt.
I was wondering, we made it do like a little MLB B side
version sort of thing. We can do that. Maybe we'll do that,
but we'll get out of here. We'll let Chicago Chicago farmer take us out
and you will talk to you next time. He's five miles an hour riding
too his head. He hopped down first with the lumpbonius face, and on
the very next pitch he up and stole second face with greatst speed. He
wasn't born, but he had to do yes, uniforn