Effectively Wild Episode 2479: Batters Up!

Summary

Effectively Wild Episode 2479: Batters Up!

Date: May 15, 2026
Hosts: Ben Lindbergh (The Ringer), Meg Rowley (FanGraphs)
Theme: Early May award races, analyzing Shohei Ohtani’s unique season, narrative vs. statistical cases for NL and AL MVP/Cy Young, standout players’ performances and defensive overhauls.

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Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the young 2026 MLB season’s developing award races, centered on the “curse” surrounding Shohei Ohtani’s bat, his Cy Young candidacy, and MVP odds. Using a blend of advanced stats, narrative perspectives, and classic Effectively Wild levity, Ben and Meg debate early-season leaderboards, evolving voter criteria, and the narratives taking shape around stars like Matt Olson, Paul Skenes, Bobby Witt Jr., Aaron Judge, and Luis Arraez.

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Key Discussion Points

1. The “Ohtani Curse” and His Two-Way Season

Timestamps: 00:47–05:23

• Ben’s bold prediction haunts him: Ben jokingly laments that his preseason prediction—Shohei Ohtani wins the NL Cy Young but not MVP—may be coming true because Ohtani’s pitching is elite while his offensive numbers are (by his standards) down.
• Ohtani's offense “slumping”: “He has a 122 WRC plus as one of the best pitchers in baseball. That is amazing, improbable, incredible, but obviously far below his established standards.” (A, 01:30)
• NL Cy Young race: Ohtani is third in NL pitching WAR, with a sub-1.00 ERA, leading in RA9 WAR and Baseball Reference WAR, but has competition from Christopher Sanchez, Jacob Misiorowski, Paul Skenes, and Shota Imanaga.
• Offensive days off: Ohtani is not hitting on as many days he pitches, and the Dodgers are giving him more rest to regroup offensively.

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2. MVP/Cy Young Voter Behavior & Award Narratives

Timestamps: 05:23–13:49

• Novelty factor: Voters may lean into “something new (is) fun” (A, 05:52) and seek reasons to support Ohtani’s Cy Young candidacy while holding MVP for another.
• Volume vs. dominance: Meg points out voters may “knock him for lack of volume” (B, 07:26) even as Ohtani’s excellence is narrative gold.
  • “He's hardly alone in that. But I do think the volume is gonna be part of that conversation. It might end up being one of the, the more annoying parts…” (B, 08:54)
• Paul Skenes & Cy Young narratives: “People love Paul Skenes, right? People, people love watching that guy pitch. And, and if they ever let him go a full nine… Sorry for yelling…” (B, 10:35)
• Sample size caveats: Both hosts emphasize that, in mid-May, projecting outcomes is “absurdity” (B, 05:23) but entertaining.
• Ohtani’s “mechanical issue”: "It's mostly a mechanical issue, and maybe the fact that he is doing both things makes it harder to break out of a slump." (A, 14:55)
• Humorous Ohtani quote (translated): "I think it's simply a matter of not being skilled enough. Which I thought was a very amusing quote because yeah, that's, that's always been Shohei's issue really when you have to just boil it down to one thing, he's just not skilled enough. So skill issue for Shohei..." (A, 15:54)

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3. Award Race Deep Dives: Olson, Witt, Judge, and Narrative Odds

Timestamps: 13:49–24:54

• Matt Olson’s candidacy: Ben and Meg see Olson as the possible front-runner in a “wide-open” NL MVP field—he’s durable, productive, and the Braves are “running away with that division” (B, 06:46).
• Bobby Witt Jr. under the radar: Witt leads all of MLB in WAR but remains overshadowed by bigger narratives.
  • “Not that people don't understand that Bobby Witt Jr. is really good, but maybe the average fan doesn't appreciate how incredible he has been because he's been somewhat overshadowed by Ohtani and Judge as anyone would be.” (A, 16:25)
• Judge's statistical victimhood: Even with a “179 WRC plus and...16 home runs already” (A & B, 18:01), Judge seems underappreciated because of expectations—“we're spoiled now by 200 plus WRC plus Aaron Judge.” (A, 18:22)
• Old-school vs. new-school voters: Witt’s high batting average and speed “is going to play” for traditional voters (B, 19:50).
• Fun leaderboard quirks: Meg delights in early weirdness like Byron Buxton’s 15 HRs, Mickey Moniak’s 175 WRC+, and “Naseem Nunez has 17 stolen bases” (B, 20:29).
• Ben Rice's breakout: The hosts discuss how Rice “isn't even the best hitter on his own team” compared to Judge (B, 21:36).
• Ballplayer aesthetics mini-segment: Discussion of “baby-faced giants” on rosters, culminating in Meg’s amused comment:
  • “What's with all these giant men with their little youthful faces? What's that about? Anyway, it's not a problem…” (B, 21:41)
  • Segues into commentary on Dylan Cease’s Tombstone-inspired look: “Man looks like an extra out of Tombstone. He is a. He is there to visit Doc Holliday.” (B, 22:17)

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4. Defensive Transformation Spotlight: Luis Arraez

Timestamps: 24:54–32:17

• Arraez’s defensive leap: Ben lauds Arraez for going from a liability to a defensive asset, crediting Ron Washington’s coaching:
  • “It's the power of Ron Washington as an infield coach. It's incredible... he is very valuable on defense as opposed to a net negative if he's even playing the field before.” (A, 25:06)
• Statistical improvement: Arraez’s 1.4 WAR is already higher than prior full seasons, due to newfound defensive value.
• Changing attitudes toward defensive stats:
  • “I like it when the disconnect between your own sense of something and what the numbers and data are telling you inspires like introspection and a desire to understand where the gap is rather than like, well, that's not right.” (B, 29:33)
• Ben on metric advancements:
  • “The sets have improved to the point where they're perceived to be precise enough that it's actionable information.” (A, 30:18)
• Technical differences in fielding stats: Discussion of the distinctions among DRS, OAA, and team vs. player positioning drastically affecting how value is attributed.

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5. Braves’ Surprising Dominance (and Host Predictions)

Timestamps: 32:17–33:16

• Braves exceeding projections: Ben notes their “6.98 winning percentage...on pace for 113 wins” (A, 32:17) vastly surpasses even optimistic preseason models.
• Meg confesses preseason doubt:
  • “I don't think I had them making the playoffs in our preseason staff predictions...boy, has it not mattered.” (B, 32:35)

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Notable Quotes

• “He has a 122 WRC plus as one of the best pitchers in baseball. That is amazing, improbable, incredible, but obviously far below his established standards.” (Ben, 01:30)
• “People love Paul Skenes...and if they ever let him go a full nine. Sorry for yelling, but I am still, you know, I don't know, Don Kelly, but we are fighting.” (Meg, 10:36)
• “It's mostly a mechanical issue, and maybe the fact that he is doing both things makes it harder to break out of a slump.” (Ben, 14:55)
• (On Ohtani’s translated quote) “I think it's simply a matter of not being skilled enough. Which I thought was a very amusing quote because...he's just not skilled enough.” (Ben, 15:54)
• “Not that people don't understand that Bobby Witt Jr. is really good, but maybe the average fan doesn't appreciate how incredible he has been because he's been somewhat overshadowed by Ohtani and Judge as anyone would be.” (Ben, 16:25)
• “It would be very easy to be...defensive about these things...I like it when the disconnect between your own sense of something and what the numbers and data are telling you inspires introspection and a desire to understand...” (Meg, 29:33)
• “The sets have improved to the point where they're perceived to be precise enough that it's actionable information.” (Ben, 30:18)

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Memorable Moments

• Meg’s enthusiastic shilling for Paul Skenes and mock exasperation at his limited pitch counts.
• The “baby-faced giants” and “Tombstone man” tangent about player looks and facial hair (21:36–22:51).
• Ben’s amused reporting of Shohei’s humble “not skilled enough” explanation.
• Meg’s celebration of Byron Buxton’s 15-HR start and Mickey Moniak’s breakout (20:29).

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Key Timestamps

• 00:47–05:23: Ohtani’s pitching/hitting dichotomy and early award leaderboards
• 05:23–13:49: How narrative, voter philosophy, and volume affect Cy Young/MVP races
• 13:49–19:50: NL/AL MVP field, Witt’s underappreciated excellence, Judge and Olson
• 19:50–24:54: Leaderboard oddities, Ben Rice, ballplayer looks, health as the ultimate decider
• 24:54–32:17: Luis Arraez’s defensive transformation and broader defensive value discussion
• 32:17–33:16: The Braves’ unstoppable start; reflections on preseason skepticism

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Takeaways

• Shohei Ohtani’s “slump” is all relative, but his historic pitching makes his season a compelling, if odd, MVP/Cy Young case study.
• Award voting continues to balance old and new schools—between WAR, raw stats, “narratives,” and novelty.
• Under-the-radar stars like Bobby Witt Jr. and players reinventing their value (e.g., Arraez) merit more attention.
• Early-leaderboards produce delightful statistical oddities.
• Health will likely play a decisive role in crowning this year’s award-winners.

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For dedicated baseball fans, this episode is a lively, statistical, and often tongue-in-cheek meditation on how we evaluate greatness—on the field and in the stories we tell about the game’s biggest stars.

Transcript

[A]

Effectively wild. Effective moral sauvage. Effective moral sauvage. Hello and welcome to episode 2479 of Effectively Wild, a baseball podcast from Fan Graphs presented by our Patreon supporters. I am Ben Lindbergh of the Ringer, joined by Meg Riley of fangraphs. Hello, Meg.

[B]

Oh, hello.

[A]

Well, today we bring a bounty of banter, emails, stat blasts. But first we must discuss a curse because I fear that I have broken Shohei Ohtani, or at least have broken the bat of Shohei Ohtani because his arm seems to be just doing dandy. But he's not hitting like his usual self and he's not even hitting as much as his usual self, which is because he isn't hitting like himself. He's being given more days off to rest, to regroup. And I, of course, made the bold preseason prediction that Shohei Ohtani would win the Cy Young Award, but not the MVP award.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Which to be clear, I was not really rooting for, but was just throwing out there as a sort of fun thought experiment. And as I noted, I wasn't really rooting for it because it would require either that he slumped offensively or suffered some sort of injury that prevented him from hitting but did not prevent him from pitching, or someone else just had a miraculous historic season and outshone him even though he managed to hit well and be the Cy Young Award winner. Well, it appears so far that one of those scenarios is sort of coming true, which is that he is having a psy caliber pitching performance, but he is not having a great offensive year. Now, by his standards, obviously. Blanket caveat, he has a 122 WRC plus as one of the best pitchers in baseball. That is amazing, improbable, incredible, but obviously far below his established standards. So I have to think that if the season ended today or when the season ends, things stand more or less where they do today that that might actually come to pass because I think he's probably the leader in the clubhouse for the NL Cy Young Award right now as we speak after Thursday's games.

[B]

You have him ahead of schemes, I think.

[A]

So. It's, it's obviously it's close and you could make an argument, sure. Ohtani is third in FanGraphs War in NL pitching war after Christopher Sanchez and Jacob Misarowski, who, like Ohtani, pitched very well on Wednesday. And he's basically neck and neck with Paul Skins and Shota Ibinaga as well. But Ohtani does have that sparkly sub one era which I think even in this day and age I think has some sort of impact as a tiebreaker, as a narrative setter. And also because of that era, he is leading in baseball reference WAR or RA9 WAR at fan grafts, which is baseball reference style runs allowed based war. So I think because of those things and just because of the narrative boost that I think, whether subconsciously or consciously, people would think that it would be kind of cool for Shohei Ohtani to win his iyoung award, and he really wants one. And who could deny him that? I think probably he would win one and people would say, skin will have another shot. He's so good. He will win again. He has already won. And really the argument, I guess for the Miz or. Or anyone over Ohtani right now is. Is innings based that they've pitched volume. Yeah, probably a volume thing. But if he somehow maintained this just sparkling sterling era, which is unlike. But if that happened, I think probably that would give him the edge. And in terms of total winsboro placement in the National League, he is tied, effectively tied, with Matt Olson trailing. If you go out to multiple decimal spots and then Ellie De La Cruz is right there, Ohtani's teammate Andy Pahes, Ohtani's other teammate, Max Muncie. I guess there's no runaway clear position player candidate, which would probably make it less likely that Ohtani would win none one and not the other. But Olson would probably be the best bet as of today. But I think even if the WAR based argument supports Ohtani and it's hard not to unless he's really like a below average hitter, it would be hard for him not to lead the league in WAR if he leads the league or comes close to leading the league in pitching war. But I think it would be seen as such a step down for him is the thing, because of how high he has set the bar for his bat.

[B]

All right, well, the first thing I'd like to do is acknowledge the absolute absurdity of entertaining this conversation on May 14th. So we'll just. We're just gonna acknowledge that and then move on because here's. Here's the conversation we're having. I think that voters will want a reason to vote for Ohtani for the Cy Young, and I think they want a reason not to vote for him for mvp.

[A]

Yeah, people like novelty. Something new is fun and, you know,

[B]

like to put a. Maybe a little bit more like dignified a spin on. On that desire. There are a lot of really fantastic players in the National League, you know, and I think that when you have a guy like Ohtani and judges the sort of avatar for this in the American League. If they are not having a season that is sort of on par with prior highs that they themselves have exhibited, I think the voters are going to look and say, you know, Matt Olson is sure tearing the COVID off the ball, man, and wouldn't it be nice?

[A]

Never takes a day off.

[B]

Never takes a day off. Right there. There are compelling narrative and statistical supports to his case at this juncture.

[A]

And the Braves having such a fant

[B]

season sort of out again, like I have to be careful about saying outperforming expectation because they are outperforming my expectation, but not my website's expectations. So anyway, but sort of at this point, at least running away with, with that division. Now, the Braves themselves are familiar with the concept of being low and then getting hot and kind of having a good run, right? So it's not like this is a subtle question by any means, but you know, there, there are compelling narratives there, I think, on the Cy Young side. And again, we are just so prem this conversation. I do feel the need to acknowledge that he is not alone in possessing, like compelling narrative. Right. I think voters are gonna like very much the idea of, you know, say, a young phenom. And that could apply to Misarowski or Skeens, right? Depending on how things sort of settle from a war and era and peripherals perspective. But Christopher Sanchez has just been so good for so long. I grant your point that like a good bit of his case, at least at this juncture, is. Is sort of a volume based case. He's thrown, you know, he's thrown 11 more innings than Ohtani. He's thrown five and a third more than skeens his ERA, which by the way, is not bad. He has 211 ERA as we're recording, and a FIP that's, you know, within striking distance of that as well. There will be, I think, voters who are like, shouldn't this guy get his due at some point here? And he just signed the extension and. Or the new extension, right? Misterowski is just like this alien little freak of a guy. Little freak of a guy. Alien freak of a guy. Towering, towering freak of a guy. And he really seems, as we have recently discussed, like he's putting it together, right? He's. He's doing a special thing. And as you noted, his last start out was like really great. And people love Paul Skeens, right? People, people love watching that guy pitch. And, and if they ever let him go a full nine. Sorry for yelling, but I am still, you know, I don't know, Don Kelly, but we are fighting. You know, it's a weird thing about us. And I don't say any of that to suggest that like the Otani of it all isn't compelling in its own right. It's wildly compelling. His ERA is under one. But I do think that there are enough voters in the body now. We don't know who the Cy Young voters are. And here I will just take, I will take another opportun to remind everyone how this works. It is not the entirety of the BBWA that votes for any of these awards. There are 30 voters. It's just, it's not the whole body. So saying, you know, the, the BBWA feels away about this is sort of hard to know because we don't know what the constitution of that electorate is at this juncture. And we won't know until after the season. So, you know, or at least the public won't know until after the season. So I do think that there are are voters within the body who even when confronted with, you know, really compelling top line stats, are gonna knock him for the lack of volume, right? Because there is a perception, and I think that it's not completely ridiculous because they aren't having him hit on days he pitches anymore. Like, they're really just not doing that very much that there's like a babying that's going on or like a protection, which is funny because they won't let Paul Skeens pitch the ninth inning. So he's hardly alone in that. But I do think the volume is gonna be part of that conversation. It might end up being one of the, the more annoying parts of that conversation. I will also Grant, and I think that, you know, the extent to which volume should matter is gonna depend on the gaps relative to the other guys. Which is part of why this is a silly conversation to entertain on May 14. Because it could well be that Ohtani, as he progresses through the year, starts going a little deeper into games, right? And then these, these margins collapse. One of these other guys could get hurt. One of these other guys could have a stretch where they're not very good and aren't particularly efficient and they aren't able to go very deep. You know, like, there's a lot that can change between now and the end of the season. But I do think that, like, other people have compelling narratives. Other pitchers will probably end up pitching more than Ohtani. That's going to matter both in terms of like, the perception of him as a guy who can be like a traditional seven inning starter. And also it will have knock on effects on his war. We will remind people the volume matters there. So like it does, there's I think a lot of ways that this could go. I think anytime you have a guy with a sub one era you gotta be like he's the leader in the clubhouse. But I also just have, I feel compelled again to say I'm, I'm weirded out by how much I'm shilling for Paul Skeens. As if one he needs advocates and to, you know, it's this stuff isn't obvious but Paul Skeens, lest we forget gave up five runs in an inning on opening day and has a sub

[A]

two ERA that's didn't even finish that inning.

[B]

He didn't even finish that inning. He didn't even finish that inning. Five runs, they were all earned.

[A]

It's pretty impressive.

[B]

We've talked about the shaky defense on that day but like it was, it was his worst outing as a pro. It is not particularly close and he has, he has a sub two era, you know, and he's, he looks like a threat to throw a perfect game every time he's out there. Or he would if they'd let him go nine.

[A]

Yeah, it's interesting to contemplate if he hadn't had that disaster start, would he now have an even more microscopic era? Would he be challenging Ohtani's ERA or did he somehow bear down even harder because he started the season in that way and he thought no, I've got to get back to my usual 1.9 something era. And so now he's satisfied. Okay, I pitched at a superhuman level to get back to my normal superhuman level and even more superhuman level. But I think the most likely outcome is that Ohtani will just start hitting more like he usually has and we'll put this out of reach probably whether he ends up winning as Cy Young or not because obviously the pitching or at least the ERA will regress. But at the same time I imagine his offense will in a positive direction and spend then it will be hard to construct at least a war based argument for anyone else. But this is, it's somewhat disconcerting to me because I can't help but feel responsible because I thought that was such a far fetched you should be responsible.

[B]

I mean like I buried that lead. I didn't even respond to your background anxiety that you have somehow had a hand in this. And here's, you know, just to pile on Ben, I think you owe an explanation to Dodgers Nation because not only is Ohtani not hitting well, that entire offense looks pretty moribund right now. I know that like, you know, they sort of shook off their their druthers bit yesterday, but this is it's not going great.

[A]

Yeah, it's very premature to have this conversation and yet I did not expect for this even to be in play a quarter of the way through the season. So it's already improbable that he is maybe on pace to do this kind of, because I thought that was one of the wildest predictions that I could come up with. And of course, if Shohei Ohtani had never existed before this season and this was his debut year, I think everyone would be marveling at how a guy who is challenging for the Saiyeg Awards is managing to post a 120something WRC plus how could will wonders never cease? And so it's only because he has been so much better than that before. Then we are getting what's wrong with Shohei Articles, which is just kind of ridiculous and sort of a tribute to him him. But he has now more often than not in in his past few turns, not hit on the days he's pitched, and they are even giving him a a day off as DH after his most recent pitching appearance. And this is following a home run that he hit earlier this week, which maybe was a sign that he is finding something. Who knows. But there's been a lot of consternation and talk about what's wrong and they all say he's not hurt or anything, and he says he feels fine too. It's it appears to be mostly a mechanical issue, and maybe the fact that he is doing both things makes it harder to break out of a slump. If you're kind of in a funk mechanically, he might just have a little less time to work on that than a hitter only would. But it's not as if he hasn't managed to do both and be a more productive hitter than this for extended stretches before. So I think he's perfectly capable of doing it and he will return to doing it at some point. But but I did see an article on the Japanese baseball site Full Count Fullcount JP and this is a Japanese language site, so this is machine translated and perhaps it's not word for word and obviously it's filtered through an interpreter anyway. But they had a story about Ohtani's explanation for this and there have been a couple of comments that he's given to reporters and there have been many articles but this one particular site quotes him as saying in the auto translation, I think it's simply a matter of not being skilled enough. Which I thought was a very amusing quote because yeah, that's, that's always been Shohei's issue really when you have to just boil it down to one thing, he's just not skilled enough. So skill issue for Shohei that he's, he's not hitting well enough. That's that. I hope I didn't break you, Shohei. My apologies. I wonder whether this could be the year, by the way, because the overall WAR lead is held by Bobby Witt Jr. In both leagues. Despite a slow offensive start, he's up to 2.9 war. He's half a win ahead of Olson or Shohei or Aaron Judge. And I think maybe there's some sentiment that hey, Bobby should win one of these someday too. And it's unfortunate that he's been overshadowed to some extent by Ohtani and Judge. He has just overlapped with these two all timers who have not only been great but have been great in more headline grabbing ways. Yeah, not just because they're playing for the Yankees and the Dodgers, but because of the way they're doing it. And Witt is more of an all around performer and an excellent defender and so it doesn't quite leap off the page as much. Plus he's in Kansas City. He's not the most scintillating quote, but I think there is some sentiment just hey, he should be recognized, he should be awarded at some point. Not that people don't understand that Bobby Witt Jr. Is really good, but maybe the average fan doesn't appreciate how incredible he has been because he's been somewhat overshadowed by Ohtanian Judge as anyone would be. So on the heels of a 10.5 war season and an eight war season, he's now on pace for just another season roughly in those heights. And I wonder whether this could be the year because obviously he doesn't have to contend with Ohtani now in the nl. And if Judge even slips a little bit, Judge is off to a fantastic start also.

[B]

But 16 home runs?

[A]

Jesus Christ. Yeah. I mean 179 WRC plus and I'm like he's doing okay, but so great. I can't believe he's also a victim of his past success. Is that it's like, well, we're spoiled now by 200 plus WRC plus Aaron Judge. And if he's merely the best hitter in baseball, but not quite Barry Bonsing, then maybe it will be an opening. And his BABIP is significantly down and so his batting average is significantly down. And not that that matters as much these days for player perception, but the numbers just aside from the homers, yeah. Aren't quite as pretty and eye popping.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And so there's an opening maybe, but I'm not sure that Witt has done enough to this point because his numbers also just the surface stats are not particularly eye popping because again, he's just such a good, well rounded all around guy and he's an excellent defensive shortstop. But it's a 142 WRC Plus. If he had his 169 WRC from 2024 with the great defense and a slight downturn for Judge, then I could see it happening. But If Witt is slashing 306, 378, 506, it's good, but it's not so great. And seven homers so far, the power numbers aren't super impressive. And 12 steals, he's not, you know, that's good, but it's maybe not better than he's done before. It's not, you know, like he's going to be 50, 50 or even 30, 30 at this rate necessarily. He's done 30, 30 twice before. So I don't know if this is quite enough to propel him. Even though WAR has a major impact on awards voting these days, I'd like to see him pick up the numbers a little bit if he really wants to challenge.

[B]

I do think that for the, you know, the old school voter, the fact that he's hitting, you know, above.300 would matter. You speak to the completeness of his game. Like he has the speed element in a way that I think is appealing to people. As an aside, it is so fun to do leaderboard sorts at this point in the season because you get to uncover things like the fact that Naseem Nunez has 17 stolen bases, which is shocking because who knew he got on base enough to actually steal 17 bases. The other part of it that I am delighting at and then we will return to the matter at hand is that Byron Buxton has 15 home runs. And let's just, let's just take a moment to appreciate like go Byron Buxton right now. Let's just, let's hold that close. Mickey MOG has a 175 WRC Plus. The world is bananas, Ben. I think that Whit, you know, hitting in a way that more sort of traditionalist voters might gravitate toward from a batting average perspective is going to play. The fact that he, you know, plays an up the middle position in very well and that he's like a threat on the base paths. It puts together a case. I think you're right that you know, Judge has 16 home runs already and he has a 179 WRC plus but it's down relative to what we've seen from him before. And we'll also just kind of see how it goes. You know, again, very silly conversation to be entertaining at this point. But I wonder how much and you tell me if you think this is bonkers like right now you could make the case. And I think the stats do. Aaron just isn't even the best here

[A]

on his own team because of Ben Rice when we talked about. Yeah.

[B]

So I don't know. Man Race is an interesting looking person. He. He's also a very young. He's got a very baby faced face. What's with all these giant men with their little youthful faces? What's that about? Anyway, it's not a problem but it does feel like we've got a couple of them floating around and more soon if you know, some of the Mariners pitching prospects make the maze.

[A]

Well it balances out the Peyton Tolley's of the world, I think.

[B]

Yeah, that's true.

[A]

Through some combination of facial structure and facial hair. Much older than their years.

[B]

As an aside. And then again we can return to wood if we want to but have you had occasion to sort of grapple with the look that Dylan Cease is putting forth right now? Man looks like an extra out of Tombstone. He is a. He is there to visit Doc Holliday. What are. Yeah, what young. It's not a bad look but it is quite distinctive and people should know separate from the three Musketeers look these are distinct aesthetics. There might be overlap in some instances. But this. This is a tombstone man.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like it's a bushy mustache he's working with.

[A]

Yeah, it's an interesting choice because I would say Dylan sees is quite a conventionally handsome man. Yeah, he's a handsome guy and yet he's. He's hiding his light under a bushel basket. Now maybe that's doing it for some folks. Maybe that's enhancing the attractiveness. But I think he has kind of conventionally attractive facial features.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And yet you can barely see them because she's increasingly hirsuit. So he's got nothing to hide under there. But he's covering it up anyway.

[B]

But it's a good counterweight to. To the baby Face Bens of the world because, my goodness, I've been.

[A]

I've been called a baby Face Ben in my head.

[B]

Yeah. To the point that you made earlier about Ohtani. Like wit, I believe this is still true. Leading position players in war over a baseball reference. Also leading them in offensive war over a baseball reference. So it's not like there aren't going to be statistical cases to make for him. And I, I do think that voters like a little bit of variety and especially if he is leading in sort of the catch all metrics, I think the odds are not bad. And, you know, people like that he stayed in KC that he got that extension. Like, I think that there are compelling narrative things there too. And he had a, he had a defensively spectacular wbc. I don't know how much that'll be in the, in the memory or mind of voters come mv time, but there's stuff here, you know, we'll. We'll see how it goes. What might end up making the difference in all of these cases, both, both in terms of the Cy Young and the MVP is just going to be health more than anything, you know. Yeah. Aaron Judge tweaks a hammy and he's down for four weeks or whatever if Bobby Witt gets dinged up, you know, breaks a weird bird bone while he's sliding in, trying to steal like it can. Just up on the apple cart that way, too.

[A]

So, yeah, I am loving the Luis Arise defensive renaissance, by the way. I don't know if we can even call it a renaissance. He wasn't that great to begin with. But the, the defensive glow up, which Michael Rosen wrote about a couple weeks ago for fan grafts. And, and it's been covered elsewhere. But the fielding run value leaderboard at baseball savant, it's Pete Crow, Armstrong and Bobby Witt Jr. At the top. Makes sense. And then tied for third with defensive standout Nico Horner is of course Luisa Rice, as we all expected. Yeah, it's amazing. It's. It's the power of Ron Washington as an infield coach. It's. It's incredible. As a manager, it does seem maybe not the best, but he is reputed to be an incredible infield coach and defensive coach, and time after time he really does seem to make that true. So evidently it's, it's incredibly hard, as he said in Moneyball, to be this good suddenly. And we don't talk enough about defensive overhauls. Maybe there aren't as many or maybe we don't trust them as much, or maybe people Just don't care as much. But it's rarer, I think, to talk about a guy who has just become much better defensively. We talk a whole lot about pitchers who added a new pitch and suddenly they've leveled up, or hitters who change their swing or something. Yeah. And with defense, maybe it's just that historically it hasn't been as valued and so players haven't devoted themselves to remaking themselves on defense in quite as concerted a way. Or maybe it's just harder to see, as defense has always been harder to appraise and assess. And maybe it's just that we don't really track. Even though we have some more granular defensive metrics right now, it's hard to pinpoint. Okay, here's exactly what Luis of the Rise is doing differently. He trained a lot, he did a lot of drills. He worked with Ron Washington. But it's not as if anytime anyone starts throwing a new pitch, that shows up instantly on their player page. And if you change your swing, okay, suddenly all your swing metrics are different and you're bad at ball outcomes and everything. And defense, I mean, Ron Washington, I saw some quote for him where he was basically like, I don't need to see the stats. I have my eyes. You know, it's like, okay, Rod, I mean, I trust Ron Washington's eyes, but I don't know, I don't trust anyone else's. And also, that's. Even coaches who seem to know what they were talking about, historically speaking, were not always the best, I think, at assessing defense. Certainly didn't always agree with the metrics. And the Sabre defensive index didn't always match what the coaches were saying when they were voting on gold clubs. Anyway, kudos to Luis Ariz for dedicating himself, rededicating himself to this. And I think he said something to the effect of he saw the numbers and how down they were on him because he thought he was good at defense or had the capacity to be at least. And I think this was sort of the impetus, the fact that the numbers said he actually wasn't very good and this was probably affecting how valuable he was and how desirable he was to teams and everything. So he's doing his usual thing at the plate. He's batting 3. 10 and he's not striking out. And he is a barely above average WRC plus despite all that. And yet that 1.4 War, that's already better than his full season wars from the past two years because he's hitting the same. But now he's not one dimensional anymore. He is very valuable on defense as opposed to a net negative if he's even playing the field before. So it's pretty impressive. You know, still homer lists, but quite valuable nonetheless.

[B]

It would be very easy to be, I'm not trying to do wordplay here. Defensive about these things. Right, we see that posture.

[A]

Yeah, like Raphael Devers style, to mention a Luis Arise teammate where he, he seemed to think that he was still good at defense even though the metrics disagreed.

[B]

And you know, I think that we can also acknowledge that of all of the statistical measures that we have access to probably the widest error bars in that space. Right. And the systems don't always agree. And I think that there's like an aven for players to get sort of huffy about those things and not be completely off base. Right. But they're much better than they used to be, the defensive metrics. And also all you had to do was really watch him. Right. Like it wasn't, it wasn't one of those cases where like the metrics were telling you one thing, but the eye test was like, oh no, but he's like really good out there. It was like, no, like this is a guy who shouldn't be playing an up to middle position like that. That seems obvious. And so I like it when the disconnect between your own sense of something and what the numbers and data are telling you inspires like introspection and, and a desire to understand where the gap is rather than like, well, that's not right, you know, because the, the answer at the end of the inquiry might be, oh, there's something missing from the way that the stats are understanding me or whatever. Right. Like maybe that's a conclusion that you come to after really digging in. But to say like, no, I want to, I want to be good both for the sake of winning baseball games and also, you know, to continue to earn well over the course of my career. So let me understand where the deficiency is. Like, I don't know, I think that that's kind of admirable. So.

[A]

And the sets have improved to the point where they're perceived to be precise enough that it's actionable information.

[B]

Right? Yes, I think that's right. That's a good way to put it.

[A]

And, and yes, there are often disparities among the defensive stats. Defensive Run Saved agrees that he was below average and now he's above average at second. But they are to some extent measuring different things also, which I think is not widely appreciated because frv, oaa, whatever. The baseball savant statcast based system that is measuring how the player does, taking into account where they were positioned and so it's given where they started, should they have made that play? Basically. Whereas at least the regular off the rack DRS is not really doing that. I know that there are different flavors of DRS and there are some that have statcast inputs and some that don't, but DRS is kind of folding in positioning often there. And so you're kind of getting dinged. I think if you're not in the right place, it's hard to know how to apportion blame or credit for that. Because is it the player? Well, often these days it's the team telling you where to stand on a positioning card. So maybe it's fair not to give the player that much credit for that these days. But yeah, historically speaking that was factored in because you didn't know where the starting point was, so you couldn't really account for that. And it was just, well, did he get to the ball and make the play or did he not? Whereas statcast is now saying, well, should he have, could he have gotten to that ball? But different stats may or may not be including that. So it's positioning is almost a team stat now more than it is a. A player specific stat. But yeah, it's kind of confusing to decide how to value that. By the way, when you said that you had to be careful about what you say about the Braves because your opinion preseason may have differed from fan graphs or the playoff odds. I think you could safely say that they're exceeding expectations. Sure.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Even the most optimistic because the preseason playoff odds had them as roughly a 90 win team and they've got a 6. 98 winning percentage as we speak. So they're on pace for 113 wins. I think even the rosiest outlook for Atlanta, they have easily surpassed.

[B]

Yes, but I think if I remember right, and as we have established, I don't think I had them making the playoffs in our preseason staff predictions. I just thought that the pitching injuries part of it was that I thought the Mets would be a lot better, you know, so I thought that they would lose, they wouldn't win the division, and that the rest of the wild card field was just more compelling. And I thought that they would not get healthy soon enough for them to make up the ground that they were gonna lose with, with all the pitching injuries that they had. And boy, has it not mattered. You know, it just. They're Ben, they're doing fine.

[A]

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