[vigilante225]

Nick's Blog Post #15 - April 2020
May 1, 2020
12-14, 3rd in NL Central, 3.5 GB

The first month of the 2020 MLB season is now in the books, and there's lots to discuss, so let's get right into it.

Team Performance

Coming off of a 98-loss season, there were definitely expectations that we would do better this year, but I'm still impressed at how quickly we've started to do better. We're right in the thick of it, just 2 games back of .500 and only 3 behind the 2nd wildcard spot. Even better, our two most fearsome division rivals, the Cardinals and the Brewers, sit at the very bottom of the NL. We're hoping this is just the beginning of our rise towards becoming a contender, and we think there's decent evidence to support the idea that we'll only get better as the season progresses.

In my last post previewing the season, I had written that our bullpen was not our strong suit. One month later, that statement has been proven completely untrue - our bullpen ranks first in the NL in terms of ERA, and has been about as strong as you could possibly hope for. Led by our closer Ken Giles (1.80 ERA, 16 K, 8 SV in 10 IP), the bullpen has performed admirably to start the season. Interestingly, so has our defense - we rank 4th in the NL in defensive efficiency, and 6th in zone rating. Two of our biggest weaknesses from last season have now become strengths. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to take full advantage of this impressive run prevention as our offense has been anemic coming out of the gates. We're 13th in the league in runs scored, and 12th in OPS. We're also 12th in home runs, which is not as much of a concern as the fact that we are 11th in OBP. This offense was intentionally constructed to favour on-base skills over power - the math says that OBP is more valuable than SLG in the context of a good lineup, and we would like to think that our lineup is a good one. It hasn't proven to be that way just yet, but we're hoping that some regression towards the mean plus a few impending lineup tweaks (more on that below) will right the ship for us.

Player Performance

- The first player we profile here needs to be Daz Cameron, who has been our unlikely MVP to start the season. Acquired just a few weeks before Spring Training began, Daz quickly made it clear that he was the best centerfielder on our roster, and has rewarded our faith in him with a masterful opening month: .309/.402/.474, 3 HR, 0.9 WAR, and the NL Rookie of the Month Award! I'm not sure where we would have been without him, but I sure am glad that he's here.

- Another happy surprise who recently arrived is OF Ben Gamel, who our rival Brewers graciously gifted to us via waivers just a few days into the season. He's a guy who can do pretty much everything except hit a lot of homers, and he's made an instant impact with us - in 88 PAs as our starting right fielder he's slashed .325/.398/.481 (149 wRC+) and produced 1.0 WAR. Not bad for a free waiver pickup making the league minimum!

- C James McCann, the supposed solution to our catcher position, has been nothing short of abysmal to start the season. He's slashed .143/.213/.179 with a 30% strikeout rate and no homers in 62 PAs. His track record and relative youth (he's only 29) suggests that this is merely a cold streak that is extra noticeable because it's come at the very beginning of the season, but we'll be monitoring the situation closely - our top catching prospect Meibrys Viloria has a 120 OPS+ in Triple-A so far, and might be getting called up sooner than we previously expected.

- Top prospect 1B Nate Lowe started off in the minors following a weak performance in Spring Training, but couldn't be kept down there for long - he had a 1.321 OPS in his first 12 games, confirming that his Spring Training failures were just a fluke and that he is indeed ready for the majors. We called him up to the majors in the last week of April, and he's already delivered - he's slashed .273/.304/.636 in 23 PAs, and hit a walkoff homer in the bottom of the 9th to win us a game against the Braves. Barring the unexpected, he's in the majors to stay now.

- Our Tristan Gray experiment at 2B did not go very well - he slashed .137/.210/.164 in 21 games before we pulled the plug, sending him down to Triple-A and calling up Tommy Edman to take his place. Edman was down there to get more reps at SS, but 2B is his natural position anyway and the need for him in the majors is more pressing. Once Nick Senzel returns in a few weeks, we may send Edman back down to keep getting him those SS reps, or perhaps he may even take over full-time SS duties from Orlando Arcia depending on how things go in the meantime. Gray, meanwhile, will get some more time to develop in the minors - it was probably unfair of us to throw him to the wolves so early, given his lack of exposure to anything above Double-A, but nothing ventured, nothing gained. In fact, I would argue that the experiment made a lot of sense, and the exact situation played out much better with Daz, so I have no regrets about this one. Gray looks like he will turn into a fine player soon enough, so I am not concerned - I just hope his major league cup of coffee wasn't so traumatizing as to stunt his further development.

- On the pitching side of things, SP Luis Castillo has been a monster to start the season - his 2.42 ERA, 2.40 FIP and 0.9 WAR rank 8th, 5th and 6th in the NL, respectively. At this point it's hard not to see him as our ace, which is what we thought he was before last year's disappointing performance, so it's good to see him starting to confirm our earlier beliefs.

- SP Lucas Giolito, on the other hand, has been rather disappointing so far. He leads the league in losses with 5 in his first 6 starts, but more importantly he's got a 67 ERA+ and a 114 FIP-. We are confident that better days are ahead for him, but he strained his oblique a few days ago which may keep him out for the next 3-4 weeks. He could probably play through it, but given the way he's been pitching it's probably better to just give him this time off to fully recover, rather than risking further injury.

- RP Ian Hamilton has been superb so far this year, pitching to an incredible 0.83 ERA and 0.55 WHIP while leading our bullpen with 21 innings pitched. That's obviously unlikely to be sustained long-term, especially given his .204 BABIP allowed, but his 2.32 FIP suggests that this dominance is not entirely a mirage.

- We're pleased to report that RP Demarcus Evans has also been very good in his own right, with a 129 ERA+ and 52 FIP- to go with 12 K/9 in 14 IP. As a Rule 5 draftee that hadn't pitched above High-A prior to this season, we weren't sure how he was going to pan out, but the early returns are encouraging.

Prospect Performance

- The trio of top prospects in our Triple-A rotation - Darwinzon Hernandez (23), Jonathan Loaisiga (25) and Jackson Kowar (23) - have completely dominated to start the season, with ERA+'s ranging from 173 to 245 and FIP-'s from 54 to 82. They've helped our Triple-A affiliate to a blazing 15-8 start, and could find themselves in the majors before long.

- OF Alex Kirilloff (22) - who is now officially our top prospect not named Nick Senzel - has dominated Triple-A pitching as expected, with a .319/.379/.495 slash line and 1.0 WAR in 104 PAs. He still has room to grow and our outfield picture is already a bit crowded as it stands, so we don't plan to rush him to the majors, but he might force our hand if he keeps hitting like this.

- OF Yordan Alvarez (22) continues to play in Triple-A in order to hone his skills in right field. He hasn't exactly made us regret that choice, as his .195/.293/.414 slash line in 95 PAs doesn't really scream "major league ready". He's been plagued by a .230 BABIP, though, and we know the skills are there, so I'm sure we will be promoting him soon enough.

- 1B Seth Beer (23) has been hot to start the season, with a .304/.432/.536 slash line (153 OPS+) in 17 Double-A appearances, leading us to promote him to Triple-A. He's not the kind of player we need right now - we already have plenty of bat-only 1B/DH type of guys in the majors and high minors - so if he keeps this level of performance up and other teams take notice, we may cash in on him in the trade market.

- CF Brandon Marsh (22) (.346/.398/.506, 136 OPS+ in 88 PAs) and SP Vladmir Gutierrez (23) (74 FIP-, 11.8 K/9 in 23 IP) are both making strong cases to be promoted from Double-A to Triple-A. We have a bit of a logjam in the outfield at Triple-A, but our rotation has a spot available for Gutierrez so we're going to move him up now and see how it goes.

- Recently acquired OF Anderson Comas (20) has had a small-sample-size explosion to start the year, with a BABIP-fueled .375/.444/.554 slash line in his 64 PAs at Single-A. There's no chance this lasts but it's good to see hm doing so well in full-season ball at just 20 years old. His teammate Jelfry Marte (19) is also doing well, with a .333/.387/.488 slash line in 93 PAs, which is an encouraging sign following his struggles at the same level last season (71 OPS+).

- SP Hunter Greene has finally returned after a long recovery following Tommy John surgery. We've decided to develop him as a pitcher full-time, and while his first two starts at High-A have been atrocious (18.69 ERA in 4 IP combined), we're just happy to have him back playing baseball again. He's still ranked as a top-50 prospect in the sport despite his injury woes, and we're optimistic that he can live up to that billing.

Other News

- A number of players across the league have already announced that they will be retiring at the end of this year: C Kurt Suzuki, C Nick Hundley, and SP Ervin Santana. None of them are likely to get a Derek Jeter-style farewell tour, but surely they will be missed.

- Several big name pitchers sustained significant injuries in April that will keep them out for several months or even the whole season, including Aaron Nola, Forrest Whitley, Walker Buehler, and Carlos Carrasco, along with OF Jason Heyward. Wishing a speedy recovery for them all!

- Jose Ramirez is leading the MLB in just about every possible hitting category, with an insane .417/.500/.913 slash line (279 OPS+!) to go along with 12 HR and 3.1 WAR in his first 26 games. That puts him on pace for an inconceivable 19 WAR season! I'm just glad he's in the AL and not the NL...

- SP Clayton Kershaw has regained his peak form to start the season, posting a hilarious 31 K/BB ratioto go along with a 0.70 WHIP and 1.67 ERA. At least he's not in our division...

- The Indians are currently the best in baseball, with a 20-6 record that puts them on pace for 125 wins. This is thanks in no small part to Jose Ramirez's Babe Ruth impression discussed above.

- On the other hand, the new-look, high-spending Cardinals are in dead last in the MLB, with a pitiful 7-19 record. You would think a team that won 88 games last year and added a bunch of expensive free agents (Anthony Rendon, Yasiel Puig and Craig Kimbrel, to name a few) would be playing at a better pace than a 44-win team, but I guess you can't predict baseball. I can't say I'm not enjoying seeing them struggle, although I fear I may live to regret the day I made fun of them for it.

Next Update

Check back next month to see how things went in May, which will (hopefully) include the triumphant return of Nick Senzel and the possible promotion of Yordan Alvarez. Til next time!