When the Cubs recently designated Clint Frazier for assignment, many were upset. I’ll confess: My own initial reaction was exasperation. Here was a guy, 27 years old and under club control for another year (if I understand the free agency/arbitration process correctly as it applies to him), with the raw tools once upon a time to be a great, great player, and the Cubs were letting him go rather than cut bait on Jason Heyward, who continues to massively struggle.
On Friday, the plot began to shift. News emerged that Frazier had cleared waivers, meaning no other MLB franchise was willing to spend a 40-man roster spot on the guy’s upside. Then, Frazier accepted the assignment to Iowa. Regardless of Heyward, the Cubs’ seemingly correct guess that they could retain Frazier worked out. They retained him. They lost none of his value, they retained whatever value is there in Jason Heyward. It’s like these guys are professionals or something.
There’s an angle here where you could say, knowing all of this, that the decision had nothing to do with Jason Heyward. But, of course, it does. Everything is interwoven, yes? And for a Cubs team that handcuffed itself to Heyward’s contract six and a half years ago, everything’s been interwoven through the guy for a while now.
The Cubs clearly were not choosing between Heyward and Frazier. It was not a binary choice. As it turned out, they kept both. But were they choosing between Heyward and Frazier (and they were realistically choosing between cutting Heyward and at least some risk of losing Frazier), it’s still possible they were making the right choice.
When you’re at this stage in a rebuild—and to name this stage, I’d say it’s one where the Cubs hope to be competitive next year and to make the playoffs in two years—there are senses in which you’re still measuring value numerically rather than role-by-role, outside of your few core pieces. Seiya Suzuki is more than a number. Nick Madrigal is more than a number. Nico Hoerner is more than a number. These are guys who fill specific roles. Frazier? He’s not entirely flexible, but he’s not entirely inflexible. Heyward? His contract will expire before the time comes to contend again. Each, then, can be thought of in a sense as a probability distribution over various levels of value. In Frazier’s case, they’re values that could directly apply with the Cubs or could be traded for comparable values in different assets. In Heyward’s case, they’re values that could be traded for comparable values in different assets. Acknowledging that the Cubs’ payroll is so low right now and will remain so low next year, relative to what they can pay and have paid recently, Heyward’s contract is a sunk cost, one they’d likely eat either way. It’s oversimplistic to a degree to do this, but comparing Heyward’s potential as an eventual trade chip to Frazier’s potential as an eventual trade chip captures a lot of the comparison, even if that isn’t exactly what’s happening.
How, then, do they compare? Right now, neither could fetch anything in a trade. Frazier just cleared waivers. Heyward is below replacement level. What would it take for either to fetch something? They’d probably have to be a little above replacement level, something Heyward most recently achieved in 2020 and Frazier most recently achieved in…2020. At least, using fWAR.
For Frazier, 2020 was not as strong a year as it was for Heyward. His wRC+ was better, but his xwOBA and total fWAR were worse. Still, they’re close enough to be comparable, and since Frazier was 25 and Heyward was 30, it’s fair to give the edge there to Frazier.
That’s the only edge Frazier has.
Every other season in Frazier’s career, he’s been below replacement level. The upside is there, and I have no reason to think he isn’t a good guy—we want him to succeed, we all want him to succeed—but he just hasn’t been a good major leaguer. Even during Heyward’s time in Chicago, though he hasn’t been great, and he’s been a major disappointment, he hasn’t been terrible. He was evenly replacement-level last year—a weak spot in the order but slightly above-average defensively and seemingly a great clubhouse presence. He was above replacement level every year before then, averaging 1.9 fWAR per season over his first four years in Wrigleyville. There’s no reason to expect him to get back to that level, but to something like a 0.5-fWAR player? A capable fourth outfielder for a team dealing with injuries? That’s not an outlandish possibility.
It’s been a brutal year and a half for Jason Heyward. But it’s been a brutal career, sad as it is to say it, for Clint Frazier. I’m not sure Frazier actually holds more value than his foil. In fact, judging by the Cubs’ front office’s move here, and what those guys know, I think Heyward holds more. I’m mildly confident about that.
In other Cubs news:
- Great weekend, all told. Two wins in a three-game set against the reigning champions, who are currently a contender? We’ll take that. Also happy to see such a good outing from Keegan Thompson on Friday just when things were trending in the wrong direction for him. Nine strikeouts in six innings is a lot. Two walks against nine strikeouts is a great ratio.
- Frank Schwindel hurt his back on Friday. Alfonso Rivas has come back up to take his place on the active roster.
- Seiya Suzuki is headed to Arizona to begin working his way back from the finger injury, which is better than nothing happening. The desire to slow-play his return is probably the right call, but it’s hard to understate how important he is to the Cubs’ next few years. He is the centerpiece of this franchise right now, whether that feels natural to say already or not.
- Elsewhere in injuries, David Bote is back rehabbing after that bout with dizziness, and Ethan Roberts tried rehabbing but then got hurt again. For those of you who follow the 40-man roster, he’s already on the 60-day IL, so no silver lining there. Purely a negative.
- A four-game set in Pittsburgh begins tonight. Caleb Kilian on the mound. Cubs are one and a half back of the Pirates right now for third in the Central and 13th in the National League. High stakes.
SoCal: Not Good!
Around the Majors:
AL West
More bad news for the Angels, as Anthony Rendon’s wrist flared back up and he nearly immediately underwent season-ending surgery. FanGraphs still gives them a one-in-five shot of grabbing a Wild Card, and they’re only four and a half back of the Rays in that chase, but the frustration continues in the land of Disney.
NL West
In other injury news down there, Manny Machado sprained his ankle—possibly doing other damage, though it’s not broken—and Mookie Betts is going on the IL with a cracked rib. On the scoreboard, it was a frustrating weekend for all three NL West contenders, with the Dodgers dropping a series to the Guardians, the Padres swept by the Rockies, and the Giants failing to take advantage, losing Sunday’s game to Pittsburgh. For the Padres, Jake Cronenworth’s six doubles on the week made him baseball’s best player these last seven days, measured by fWAR.
NL Central
The Brewers climbed back even with the Cardinals yesterday, and the Pirates get the excitement of top-ten prospect (MLB-wide, not within their system, he’s first in the Pirates’ system) Oneil Cruz coming up for tonight’s game. In other bright spots on that side of the standings, the Reds got possibly the best outing of the season from any pitcher on Tuesday when Tyler Mahle threw a complete-game, twelve-strikeout, three-hit, zero-walk shutout of the Diamondbacks in Arizona.
AL Central
Not without cause for happiness themselves, the Tigers brought up Riley Greene, also among baseball’s best-expected minor leaguers. Through nine plate appearances, he’s been on base six times. 21 years old.
Meanwhile, with that series win in Los Angeles, the Guardians are now just a game back of the Twins in the division race. They’re getting close to the White Sox in the FanGraphs playoff probabilities. This division might not be very good, but it’s entertaining, and I’d take that over the former, personally.
AL East
The Yankees mowed through the Rays and Blue Jays last week, winning five of six. This week, they get the Rays and the Astros. The Red Sox surged up alongside the Rays but currently trail them by half a game for third place in the division and fifth in the American League.
NL East
New York, Atlanta, and Philadelphia each only lost twice last week, but the Phillies won six times to the others’ four. That’s turning into a bit of a stacked division, and the NL has eight hearty playoff contenders vying for six spots, with only two teams more than 90% likely, per FanGraphs, to grab one themselves.
Moving On from Davidson, Moving On to Chapel Hill
Two pieces of college basketball news from the weekend. First, Bob McKillop is retiring at Davidson, leaving the program after 33 years and handing the reins off to his son, Matt. Should Davidson remain a pertinent basketball brand, McKillop will always be remembered as the guy who brought them there. Should Davidson fade, McKillop will always be remembered as the guy who, once upon a time, made Davidson a national player. One Elite Eight, ten NCAA Tournament appearances, ascension from independent status (the Wildcats went 4-24 in his first year there) to a spot as one of the best programs in one of the best mid-major conferences in America. Consistently free from scandal, McKillop took a school that isn’t wholly unusual in the low ranks of Division I—a low-major in the Southeast—and turned them into something wholly unusual: A consistently strong mid-major in the Southeast now known in the mainstream sports discourse as a basketball school.
Across the Piedmont a short ways, UNC grabbed Pete Nance over the weekend, arguably the final transfer of immediate national significance. The exiting Northwestern big man gives the Tar Heels a clear replacement for Brady Manek and pulls them up to 4th in T-Rank’s current 2022-23 ratings, the best objective source we have at the moment for national rankings. (And a good one, at that!)
Omaha: Tournament Formats and Leverage
The college baseball NCAA Tournament has a tough task. It needs to happen pretty fast. There can’t be too many games. It has to whittle 64 teams down to a believable national champion.
The way the NCAA currently solves this riddle is to allow teams to win the College World Series with a maximum of four losses. You could go 3-1 in the Regional, 2-1 in the Super Regional, and 5-2 in Omaha and still win the national championship if you did it all in the right order. That’s a great clip—a 10-4 record is, in MLB terms, a 116-win pace—but compared to basketball, where you have to go 6-0? It solves a little for the randomness of baseball.
It also keeps each game immensely meaningful, which makes for immense drama. In the Majors, even a Game 5 with a seven-game series tied leaves the winner 75% likely and the loser 25% likely to win the series if home-field advantage is ignored and the teams are assumed to be of equal quality. That’s a big gap, but the winner’s only three times as likely as the loser to win the series. In games like last night’s between Oklahoma & Notre Dame and tonight’s between Arkansas & Mississippi, the winner is 37.5% likely to win it all and the loser is just 6.25% likely, measured the same way. That’s a 6x multiple. Coming out of the first round games, the winners are 21.875% likely while the losers are 3.125% likely, for a 7x multiple. Through this leverage, the sport’s governing body creates a feeling not dissimilar from that of single-elimination baseball while still giving good teams a chance to flub up once here and there. Impressive balancing act by the oft-maligned NCAA (maligned for other reasons, yes, but let’s still celebrate the organization’s good moves).
In Colorado, Avalanche Means Avalanche
If you are in the path of lightning, there is normally a rather easy way to make yourself safe. You just go inside. If you are in the path of an avalanche, you better up and run.
The Avalanche beat the Lightning 7-0 on Saturday, and while the Lightning have come back from a 2-0 deficit and a 3-2 deficit these playoffs and get Games 3, 4, and 6 (if they get there) at home, their odds are significantly worse in this situation than they were in either of those others. The Avalanche are better than the Rangers and the Leafs. The Lightning were competitive in their Game 2 loss to the Rangers and their Game 5 loss to the Leafs. Recency, in hockey, seems to have some predictivity, based on our limited research.
Game 3 is tonight in Tampa, and Gelo—our NHL probability model—has officially passed betting markets, viewing the Avalanche as the better moneyline play, and even as a positive-value play at many books. Gelo’s game-to-game reactions are based on wins, losses, and margin of victory/defeat. It reacts quickly, relative to other elo-adjacent models. To Gelo, a 7-0 win against one of the best teams in the league is a big deal. Right now, the model views the Avalanche as road favorites by 0.26 goals. It views the Avalanche as better than 6-in-7 likely to win the Stanley Cup. Looking at this, looking at what we saw Saturday, looking at what markets initially thought about all these teams, entering the postseason, it’s hard to see the Lightning winning this, and it’s easy to see the Avalanche grabbing yet another victory tonight.
My Phone’s Browser: Where the Bets Stand
We’ll be placing today’s right after we publish these notes, but we’re in good shape. Our average ROI is going to look artificially high until the Finals end, but we’re close to assured of profitability on the NHL futures effort as a whole and we got a little F1 win yesterday, even though it wasn’t worth much. Basically, barring a hot streak on NASCAR or IndyCar, we’re probably going to be somewhere around negative three percent or negative four percent until the end of September, when MLB future payouts start coming in and we probably close that gap. I still would estimate that we close it in full by the end of October, especially if we don’t both get aggressive and perform poorly on college football and early NHL single-game picks.
**
Viewing schedule, today/tonight, second screen rotation in italics:
- 1:10 PM EDT: Marlins @ Mets, Rogers vs. Peterson (ESPN+)
- 2:00 PM EDT: Stanford (0-1) vs. Auburn (0-1), College World Series (ESPN)
- 7:00 PM EDT: Arkansas (1-0) vs. Mississippi (1-0), College World Series (ESPN)
- 7:05 PM EDT: Cubs @ Pirates, Kilian vs. Brubaker (MLB TV)
- 7:10 PM EDT: Yankees @ Rays, Cole vs. McClanahan (MLB TV)
- 7:20 PM EDT: Giants @ Atlanta, Webb vs. Fried (MLB TV)
- 8:00 PM EDT: Avalanche @ Lightning, Game 3 (ABC)
- 8:10 PM EDT: Cardinals @ Brewers, Mikolas vs. Burnes (FS1)
- 8:10 PM EDT: Blue Jays @ White Sox, Berríos vs. Lynn (MLB TV)
