Orioles pursuing Wacha?

[Frobby]

18 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Stat cast park effects numbers.

Thank you.  It seems logical enough that it is easier for a RH hitter to pull one over the wall than for a LH hitter to lob one over oppo.  Neither is easy, but I’d venture a guess that a higher percentage of opposite field homers are wall-scrapers compared to pull-side homers.  Still, considering that hitters (both R and L) pull about 40% of the time and hit to the opposite field only 25% of the time (per Fangraphs), I’d expect that the impact on RH batters would be greater.  I’ll still want to see a few more years of data before totally buying into the 2022 park factors.

[Tony-OH]

19 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/leaderboard/statcast-park-factors?type=year&year=2022&batSide=L&stat=index_wOBA&condition=All&rolling=no
 

Just have to make sure you are only looking at 2022 and not doing 3 year averages. 
 

And from there, you can go through the splits of lefties and righties, etc…

So I looked at those ballpark factors and they seem to jump back and forth from year to year. I'd need to to see a 3-year roll before making that assessment that it hurt lefties more than righties. Though I will say you are right about the lefties not being able to hit those oppo homers like they used to.

[Sports Guy]

3 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

Kluber scares me because he's a pitchability junk baller now, and those can blow up at any point at his age. 

I don’t disagree but of the bottom of the barrel signings, he may be the best of the bunch. 

[Sports Guy]

2 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Thank you.  It seems logical enough that it is easier for a RH hitter to pull one over the wall than for a LH hitter to lob one over oppo.  Neither is easy, but I’d venture a guess that a higher percentage of opposite field homers are wall-scrapers compared to pull-side homers.  Still, considering that hitters (both R and L) pull about 40% of the time and hit to the opposite field only 25% of the time (per Fangraphs), I’d expect that the impact on RH batters would be greater.  I’ll still want to see a few more years of data before totally buying into the 2022 park factors.

Again, that’s fine..but the rush to judgement that it’s so tough in righties is still based on one year and it’s all based around homers.  A hitters/pitchers park isn’t only determined by the HR ball.  

Going to be harder to use all fields for all hitting of you are a lefty.

The bottom line is right now, perception isn’t reality and the focus on the left side is actually bs and unfounded.

[Just Regular]

Park factors and platoon splits can be flimsy in 1-year samples.    They might not have two nickels to rub together for players, but I'm confident they have thought methodically about the kind of Bats they want in this iteration of the ballpark.

If you squint you might be able to see elements of a strategy - I believe the Move the Wall back plan was in place by the time even of the Kjerstad-Cowser draft choices, training the minor league hitters on pulling the ball in the air, and now being unable to say they want one more bat for the lineup without "left-handed" being inked into the text.

Mountcastle and Mayo could be battling in 2 years to maybe be the only RH bat in the entire lineup.    Then it may be fun to see the Orioles home run, home field advantage across 81 games.     I guess there's a decent chance Gunnar's first home oppo HR is inside the park.

[Ripken]

I'm sure Wacha is only a fall back option if Eovaldi doesn't accept our 2yr/$14M offer.

[Sports Guy]

17 minutes ago, Just Regular said:

Park factors and platoon splits can be flimsy in 1-year samples.    They might not have two nickels to rub together for players, but I'm confident they have thought methodically about the kind of Bats they want in this iteration of the ballpark.

If you squint you might be able to see elements of a strategy - I believe the Move the Wall back plan was in place by the time even of the Kjerstad-Cowser draft choices, training the minor league hitters on pulling the ball in the air, and now being unable to say they want one more bat for the lineup without "left-handed" being inked into the text.

Mountcastle and Mayo could be battling in 2 years to maybe be the only RH bat in the entire lineup.    Then it may be fun to see the Orioles home run, home field advantage across 81 games.     I guess there's a decent chance Gunnar's first home oppo HR is inside the park.

To not think lefties won’t be greatly effected is wrong. Again, it’s not just about homers.

Get good hitters and pitchers. The park is going to be tough on anyone. Stop pigeonholing yourself into thinking they need to be lefties.  Even if the numbers end up favoring righties, the lefty numbers aren’t going to be good and “hitter friendly”.

[RZNJ]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

To not think lefties won’t be greatly effected is wrong. Again, it’s not just about homers.

Get good hitters and pitchers. The park is going to be tough on anyone. Stop pigeonholing yourself into thinking they need to be lefties.  Even if the numbers end up favoring righties, the lefty numbers aren’t going to be good and “hitter friendly”.

It's only logical to think the wall will affect RH hitters more than LH hitters.   The overwhelming majority (probably in the 90%) of hitters pull the ball more than they hit to the opposite field.  Now, there may be some statistic that hitters pull more on the ground and hit the ball more in the air to the opposite field.  Could be.   Now, is it to the point that we should ignore getting RH hitters and only look to get LH hitters?   No.

[Roll Tide]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

Kluber is a better option than Wacha

So he was basically Lyles this past year. Last year pitched 80 innings and you’d have to go back to 2018 to find his last really good season.And that’s kinda irrelevant in 2023. See what I just did ? 
 

I guess beauty is They eye! The only really good guy left is Rodon. The rest your hoping to catch lightning in a bottle in some fashion.

[BRobinsonfan]

16 hours ago, Emory Eagle said:

Very bleh.  Doesn’t seem like the FO really believes it’s quite time for “lift off” yet.

I'm beginning to think Elias was misquoted.  What he actually said was was "left out" instead of "lift off."  

Edited December 15, 2022 by BRobinsonfan

[Sports Guy]

13 minutes ago, Roll Tide said:

So he was basically Lyles this past year. Last year pitched 80 innings and you’d have to go back to 2018 to find his last really good season.And that’s kinda irrelevant in 2023. See what I just did ? 
 

I guess beauty is They eye! The only really good guy left is Rodon. The rest your hoping to catch lightning in a bottle in some fashion.

What?  Kluber had a lot of pretty solid stat cast numbers, far better than Lyles. He was worth 3 fWAR (more than double Lyles) and his FIP was almost a full run better.

It’s absurd to think they were the same last year.  

[Sports Guy]

26 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

It's only logical to think the wall will affect RH hitters more than LH hitters.   The overwhelming majority (probably in the 90%) of hitters pull the ball more than they hit to the opposite field.  Now, there may be some statistic that hitters pull more on the ground and hit the ball more in the air to the opposite field.  Could be.   Now, is it to the point that we should ignore getting RH hitters and only look to get LH hitters?   No.

If it were that obvious, it would have started to show immediately.  And the numbers have a pretty wide differential as well. It’s not like it’s really close.

If you go back the last several years, the park usually favored righties over lefties although there were years were there were exceptions.  
 

Edited December 15, 2022 by Sports Guy

[Slight Upward Arc]

I’ve heard analysts say that fWAR is better for predictive analysis while bWAR is more of a reflection of what was actually accomplished during that measuring period. 
 

bWAR: Kluber 0.7; Lyles 1.0

So at least according to bbref, Lyles was slightly better last year. But the more predictive metric thinks Kluber is the better play moving forward.

Edited December 15, 2022 by Slight Upward Arc

[Roll Tide]

3 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

What?  Kluber had a lot of pretty solid stat cast numbers, far better than Lyles. He was worth 3 fWAR (more than double Lyles) and his FIP was almost a full run better.

It’s absurd to think they were the same last year.  

Kluber.    10-10    4.34 ERA in 164 innings over 31 starts   .7WAR

Lyles      12-11     4.42 ERA in 179 innings over 32 starts  1.0 WAR

 

I can cherry pick too! Pretty comparable IMO. 

[Roll Tide]

25 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

It's only logical to think the wall will affect RH hitters more than LH hitters.   The overwhelming majority (probably in the 90%) of hitters pull the ball more than they hit to the opposite field.  Now, there may be some statistic that hitters pull more on the ground and hit the ball more in the air to the opposite field.  Could be.   Now, is it to the point that we should ignore getting RH hitters and only look to get LH hitters?   No.

Wacha is a reverse-splits guy. In 2022: LHH: .188/.252/.345 RHH: .265/.306/.455