Verlander’s FB velo this season is above his career average. His k rate is 8.5 against a career 9.06 rate and his walk rate is much lower than his career rate. He’s been dominant. He projects to be well worth $35M+/yr over the next 2-3 years. My guess is that if he keeps this up he will get something like $70M/2yrs with a lesser 3rd year player option that includes incentives.
The velo is fine but he's not getting the whiffs he used to for some reason. Comparing to 2019, the SwStr% on his fastball has fallen from 14.3% to a sad 6.8% while his slider is down around 6% to 17%. Framber has two pitches with a higher SwStr% than any of JV's this season. I think $25M is fair for his current production but $35M would be a big overpay.
How can you tell that hitters aren’t just watching more strikes from JV rather than swinging and missing? Is his spin rate or movement down? Seems like if the end result (k rate) is there then it doesn’t matter how it happens.
Trevor Rosenthal is having a showcase today. Seems like a potential good fit for Houston since they have a deep bullpen and AAA pitching staff that could mitigate his injury risk, and they have some payroll flexibility. If he’s “back”, he’s a dominant closer. Adding him to the stable with Pressly, Neris, Montero, Abreu, Stanek, and Maton would probably eliminate the need to trade for a lefty.
Batters aren't watching more strikes. Spin rate and movement are down. The end result (K rate) is way down relative to his previous Astros time. He still has great control and the de-juicing of the ball has removed the cheap homers (his only weakness as an Astro). If MLB had not juiced the ball, he may have won an MVP as an Astro.
It would be one thing if we were still in the first month of the season, but he's thrown over 400 fastballs this season and 100 pitches is typically the rule of thumb for repeatability. His spin rate is down nearly 200 RPM on his fastball and slider. I also note the "stuff" grade on Grove's pitchingbot app for Verlander is down big time from 2019 - 55 in 2019 vs 40 in 2022.
I think with the dead ball his current approach could more or less work with his ERA playing above his FIP/xFIP, but who knows how long MLB will go with the dead ball. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they went to a lower drag ball before the end of the season, much less next year.
That makes sense. That might make it less likely that Houston ponies up to keep him, but I don’t think it will have a major impact on the deal he ends up signing. Somebody will pay for the track record and bottom line results.
I think a lot of teams are pissed at MLB for changing the ball. Not necessarily that they like/dislike the new ball, but that player development/acquisition decisions are based on long term performance. MLB has been willy nilly with the ball's properties while teams are shelling out $100M plus contracts to players who's performance may change depending on which ball is used. Edit: I think MLB will try to find a happy medium between 2019 ball and 2022 ball next year, but I think at least some teams are pushing for that to be it.
I think Crane and JV have a handshake deal. If healthy, I see Crane giving JV that deal (or a similar deal with easily met bonuses to get to 35 per).
If he keeps producing and feels like he can get a Scherzer level deal there is no way he leaves $70M+ on the table out of loyalty.
He will get 35 for one year at the end of the season from somebody. Today I would offer 2 additional years @ 25 with a mutual option for a third plus an additional 5 mil signing bonus to be paid on his retirement as an Astro. The price will go up every day we wait.
The change he made on 5/18 hasn't effected the results much, but he's hitting the ball harder without the extremely high LA.
I just trust him more than the vast majority of the hitters to make adjustments that can pay off. I do sometimes think he over thinks it, but I have been told he is the guy that Alvarez and others go to along with Brantley to discuss hitting mechanics. If you think about it, the Astros have quite a few guys that are really big on the mechanics of their craft and are hard workers. Yordan Alvarez is quietly an extremely disciplined and hard worker and we are seeing the benefits of that.
At this point I think he just is who he is unless he makes a major mechanical change. Only so much you can do when you can’t hit the ball that hard.
