I think it will be a good battle you a crafty vet a fireballer and a spot pitcher that will be very interesting.
Let's see who's in the contest... Sipp, Guduan, Gose, Boshers. Cionel Perez and Framber Valdez are also lefties likely to appear in ST but they are viewed more as starters so I don't know if they would be considered for the pen. I predict Sipp enjoys a resurgence this year driven by more use of the high fastball and slider off the plate. Sipp ERA of 3.40 by All Star Break. Gose will be sent back to Rangers. Guduan and Boshers start the season in AAA (Boshers has an option remaining). We see Cionel in September.
Random / interesting-- Payroll as a % of revenue. League average 44.66% -- Astros just below that. (I don't know if lower is definitely good since revenue isn't necessarily equal to winning--but significantly higher like the Tigers and Orioles is a bad sign.) credit: https://twitter.com/EvilNeal/
You want lower payroll and higher revenue, so a higher number is bad. The fact that the Yankees can spend 200 million, and still be near the bottom in salary/income ratio is extremely aggravating. Good news, these are supposedly 2016 income/ 2017 opening day figures. If we were in the top half of revenue in 2016, we should be in pretty damn good shape financially given how well 2017 went, and how many more attendees we should have in 2018.
Boy baseball is crazy. The Yankee's revenue is 2.5 times that of Miami or TB. Amazing that either of those teams have had any success.
If those figures are real, then Houston should be able to sustain a $180M for any years they’re contending. And even when rebuilding, payroll shouldn’t be below $110M.
So let me try to understand this. I mean I didn't graduate college so this may be way above my head. But.... The Red Sox, Yankees, and Dodgers have a combined revenue of $1,446,108,121 or the GDP of St. Lucia and a combined payroll of $634,580,046.00 or almost double the GDP of Micronesia and the Astros topped THEM ALL for the ring? Just checking.
I definitely understand the numbers and what is ideal from a business perspective...that's straightforward of course. My point was, it depends on perspective. I (as a fan) don't necessarily care if the number is super high, because ultimately if we're winning, I'm ok with a higher number. Hell, the Astros might end up as a higher number that's winning in a few years. So I don't think a somewhat higher number is necessarily bad--unless you're in management or ownership, in which case you always want to get better. But being way above the mean is bad regardless--and even moreso if you're losing.
Jake and Marwin top the list of hitters who most improved the distance of their fly balls in 2017. https://www.fangraphs.com/fantasy/nine-2017-average-fly-ball-distance-surgers/ "The spike in strikeout rate, coupled with an elevated fly ball rate suggest something is going on here, and given that his power output skyrocketed, this appears to be a new man. He has now essentially become a more fly-ballin’ version of Keon Broxton." My italics. A lot of people think Jake's 2017 batting line was a fluke. May 2018 prove them wrong.
The .815 OPS was awesome to see last year. My guess is his defense has passed its peak, but mentally he can improve his game enough to get the K's down. If he can be traded as part of a premium reliever / catcher / OF piece I'm all for that too.
If his defense was already passed its peak in his age 26 season, something would be drastically wrong.
Defense typically peaks very early. It would be very normal for him to already have peaked defensively. It would not be normal for him to go what he was a couple years ago to what he has been the past two in such a short amount of time.
Speed is the most identifiable component of defense to start going down hill early. Experience & skill honing can make up for it for a time, but age catches up.
Marisnick posted a .985 fielding percentage as an outfielder in 2017, lower than his career average of .991. I haven't calculated his career average through the 2016 season but it was probably around .993. Can he post a better fielding percentage in 2018? I'd like to see it happen, but time is no longer on his side. This isn't to say Marisnick's defense is bad by ML standards, just to say that there is some reason for concern about the trajectory of his defensive performance. I tend to think Jake's offensive improvement is here to stay for a few years. Hopefully he can bridge the gap to Tucker. If he falls off a cliff, then perhaps Fisher or Kemmer will step up.
He should get a bonus .020 points added to his fielding % just for the walk-off strike he threw to McCann from LF to beat the Yankees in the regular season last year.
Although you qualified it with "typically", players that are recognized as elite don't peak early. Unless there is an injury which leads to a decline in speed or arm strength or vision, there is no reason for a 26 year old to have already peaked at 25. If Marisnick is already on a noticeable downward slide in his defense, then he was overrated to begin with.
