2019 Phillies Season Discussion (part 2)

[mdougherty12]

Nola's career splits (not including tonight's game):

4 days rest - 55 starts, 4.50 ERA
5 days rest - 58 starts, 2.60 ERA
6+ days rest - 10 starts, 2.54 ERA

2018 splits:

4 days rest - 13 starts, 2.71 ERA
5 days rest - 17 starts, 1.83 ERA
6+ days rest - 3 starts, 4.41 ERA

2019 splits:

4 days rest - 14 starts, 3.83 ERA
5 days rest - 15 starts, 3.58 ERA
6+ days rest - 1 starts, 1.50 ERA

Nola's better with the extra day of rest, but it still seems like a reasonable plan. The Phils need more good starters.

[Austinfan]

The first symptom of a tired arm isn't loss of velocity but loss of command, I think because pitchers subconsciously respond to a slight loss of arm strength by overthrowing. Nola, when he's right, doesn't run a lot of deep counts.

I think what we're seeing is they should let Nola have that extra day of rest when the schedule dictates, instead of trying to squeeze out an extra start or two.

[Lawman]

Well, with a weird off day this coming Friday, I think the Phils should have Nola start Sunday, not Saturday.

[andyb]

Nola is not the biggest guy. It is understandable if he is only average in durability.

[Philsmania]

Nola certainly hasn't been bad but he has had a bit of a down season. If he was a #2 or #3 starter, he would be doing just fine. However, it's been debatable whether or not he has pitched like a true ace this season.

It should be noted, however, that his run support has often been lacking this season. While is overall run-support is 5.38, that is due largely to four games in which they scored double digit runs for him. In thirteen games he's started, they've scored only three or fewer runs and only six games where they've scored four to six runs for him. Their record in those thirteen games where they scored three or fewer runs for him is 5-8 and in five of the losses, the opposition scored four or fewer runs meaning that those were games in which he put them in position to win but they failed to do so (though interestingly, he got tagged with the loss in only two of those games). Run support has been either feast or famine for him.

Aaron Nola 2019 Pitching Game Logs | Baseball-Reference.com

[zambonir]

Don’t look now, but the Phillies offense has become a strength

Just not last night.

I think the story of the season is really that they just can't ever consistently align good hitting and good pitching. And then you have a bullpen that isn't going to be able to protect close leads in the middle innings (and when the close falters, as they all do sometimes, it's hurts that much more).

[schillingfan]

I agree. They just seem unlucky this year. Sort f everything that can go wrong does go wrong.

[Austinfan]

The hitting is sufficient, but not outstanding.

Adding Bohm, Stott and maybe Moniak the next couple years and Haseley improving (coming on strong to finish the season) will help. Still need that one "outlier" LA player to break out.

The SP cratered, a healthy Arrieta and Eflin without a mid-season funk and this is a much better team. You don't need five aces, you do need five SPs who keep you in games for 5-6 innings before you turn to your deep bullpen.

The entire bullpen went on the IR, uh oh.

[Austinfan]

There is luck involved:

Atlanta outfielder Ronald Acuña Jr., the top prospect in baseball, was about 5-foot-10 and 160 pounds soaking wet when the international scouts came calling in Venezuela.
His $100,000 signing bonus was his biggest offer and almost double what the Royals, who finished second, wanted to pay.
Acuna didn't rank among MLB Pipeline's Top 30 International Prospects list in 2014. Nobody on the list has advanced past Class A, except for Franklin Perez, who ranked No. 21 and signed with the Astros for $1,000,000.

How Atlanta got Acuna when everyone else missed

Albies for $350,000 in July 2013.
Johan Camargo for $42,000 in July 2010.

None were big bonus babies, just the usual 2nd/3rd tier LA signings.
We hit on Sixto and used him to get Realmuto, but that's about it since Hernandez, Galvis and Franco.
We have a few pitchers, but we need to hit on one player who can fill out the starting 8.

[fish]

Historically big bonuses for Latin 16 year-olds was like burning cash and signing several $100k+ bonus types was a better bet. That may still be true, but it's worth noting that the system has evolved in the last few years to better evaluate guys and more of those big bonus guys are becoming real prospects than before.

[andyb]

International spending has always been a little less reliable in terms of results than draft spending because the prospects are a couple of years younger (or 5 in terms of college players). But there has also been a strong relationship between the top prospects and performance (like Miguel Cabrera).

There will always be $100K signings in both the draft and international markets that make it. That does not mean one should not spend money though and the $100K signings of 5 years ago internationally probably cost $300K today. Every good organization does a mix. Getting away from having to pay players because they work for certain buscones is also a plus, making the market a little more fair.

It would be foolish though for an organization to rely mostly on cheap signings. There is way too much information out there for that to be a good strategy. Most of the top prospects cost decent money and if an organization gets none of the top 30-50 (as we might have been shutout this year) then they likely will have a pretty mediocre free agent class.

[allentown]

Ortiz was the huge signing that year. Not quite a bust yet, but not working out well with comments Phillies probably don't add him to 40-man, meaning anyone can gamble on him really cheap, with 26-man rosters. Meanwhile, not quite as expensive Vlad, Jr. in MLB. All the comments I read leading up to that signing period said Ortiz was good, but nowhere near top of his class. We fell in love with and spent just about our whole international budget that year on the wrong guy. That's scouting or contacts, not a warning not to spend. Between them, the combined Ortiz and Vlad are a true bargain. We are simply the loser in this comparison. Other teams have had successful big international signings. Encarnacion and Ortiz: not so much. That is on our international scouting. Picking from the best talents and choosing the right guys to get the top $ seems to be a different skill set from finding bargains among a flock of low-bonus guys Also, finding top OFs and other position player seems to be a different scouting skill set than finding pitchers. We seem to do well on catchers and ok on middle IFs. OFs and corner IFs are a real barren spot in our international scouting. We've spent the most $ there and come up almost totally dry. This seems a systemic weakness which must be solved if we are to compete.

[andyb]

And there is a legit point in that 538 article that teams need to focus their most resources and best instruction on the better prospects. You just can't sign 100 guys every year. Better to focus on 30-50 and give them enough resources to prosper.

To me the proper international strategy is to sign 5 $500K+ guys every time with a couple over a million. Then fill in the rest of your budget with low cost players. At some point one needs to get their share of the top talent. Ideally you want multiple top 50 guys every year. At least if you want to keep up with the Yankees and Dodgers and Padres you do.

[schillingfan]

To me the proper international strategy is to sign 5 $500K+ guys every time with a couple over a million. Then fill in the rest of your budget with low cost players. At some point one needs to get their share of the top talent. Ideally you want multiple top 50 guys every year. At least if you want to keep up with the Yankees and Dodgers and Padres you do.

we have the money to spend Ike the Dodgers and Yankees and certainly the Padres.

[Austinfan]

There are 2-3 LA players each year worth the big bonus (high probability of success) then 10-20 who get overpaid (i.e. odds drop off very rapidly because signing 16 year olds is far riskier than 18 year olds).

I think the biggest mistake made is to focus on current performance, since that often is self-selection of LA players who physical mature earlier, not have the most upside. Which is why I like the Philly focus on skinny, undeveloped pitchers at low cost, betting that a few will add significant velocity. For some reason, they don't do as well with position players, so far all their mid-price players haven't panned out.

[andyb]

Any evidence for that assertion. I think a pretty good percentage of the million plus bonus guys succeed. It is not as high as in the draft, but that is understandable because of the age of the prospects.

It is hard to figure out what you would recommend from your posts. Do you advocate signing 100 low dollar guys every year? You seem to criticize spending money every time it is spent.

[Austinfan]

I posted it a few months ago, really not much difference between #5 and #50.
Odds are low for all. The few hits are spread across "rankings" and bonus payments.
Not sure anyone has done a formal study.

[andyb]

But you make a bold assertion - no difference. And then we see guys like Miguel Cabrera and Vlad Guerrero and Juan Soto succeed all the time. There is also a much more gradual level of international bonuses because of the cap system now. There are not lots of $4 million bonuses. There are a large number in the $1-$2 million range. This acknowledges the variety of outcomes with 16-year-olds.

But the main thing is you keep posting that bonuses make no difference. So the only conclusion is that you advocate going with all low bonus players. That would be a bad strategy. First, you don't have time to develop 100 different prospects every year. While there is some value in going deeper, there are also costs in spreading the instruction around and away from the better prospects. Instead of complaining all the time that it is all meaningless, maybe advocate a policy once in a while. You have opposed the Phillies spending to their international limit in the past. You don't seem to acknowledge that teams can go after the larger bonus guys and still cast a net to sign intriguing low cost options. The Braves can sign Acuna AND play heavily in the higher bonus market (sometimes even legally!). It seems to me we should want to emulate the Braves' international development system and acknowledge where our system has fallen short.

[allentown]

And the other issue is that these approaches are not mutually exclusive. Every team signs many (not 100) but many low-bonus guys, just to fill their rosters in the DR, while moving the better players up to GCL-level leagues. With two GCL teams and two DR teams, of course the Phillies are going to sign a ton of low-bonus DR guys. So, AF gets his preferred approach no matter what. We should be able to get the approach you outline as well. If we sign 50 guys for an average $25K bonus, that leaves ample budget space to sign your multiple $500K guys. I like your approach a lot, because it gives multiple shots to find one right, plus-tools guy a year. As I complained above, the Phillies really have shown zero ability to identify guys who truly are $1+ million, let alone $4 million talents. It seems we have far better odds getting four $500K guys per year. Once Sal and his guys show that they have the contacts and scouting talent to do that successfully, then we can think again of shooting the moon on a $1-3million talent they have fallen in love with. It is really hard to understand how Sal and his crew can be the kings of spotting good, cheap talent, including Ruiz, and close to totally fail at identifying good high-bonus talent. Of course, the explanation could be as simple as Sal knows about guys like Vlad, Jr., but the guys peddling them are part of the under-the-table money cheating rings. I don't recall seeing Toronto spoken of the same way as the Dodgers, Braves, and Yankees, but perhaps they are. In any case, there is something very wrong with our scouting for other than position players. This isn't a problem extended from way back -- we were the only team in on Rollins and also snagged Rolen and took a chance on the injury/personality questioned Hamels (and Drabek). Currently, we seem well below average in identifying top draft and amateur international 18-year old and below talent.

[Austinfan]

I am not against bonuses, I'm for an optimal strategy, either you're in on the few top guys (Phillies bady miscalculated on Ortiz) or you should avoid the next twenty or so because they'll get overpaid. The $300 to $500K bonus strategy to me is more efficient, because you can focus on upside plays rather than the ones that are already mature enough to catch all the scouts' eyes and drive up their price.