Pitching Grips

2:01 Ben Clemens : Hey everyone, welcome to the chat. Let’s just get started, as I’m sure there are many fun opening day questions to answer and right now, I’m not writing anything so I’m at full focus 2:01 Guest : If you’re GM of the Tigers, do you put McGonigle on the opening day roster, or wait a few weeks to manipulate his service time? 2:02 Ben Clemens : put him on the opening day roster 2:02 Ben Clemens : the value of that service time manipulation is down with the various incentives (both making it easier for the player to recoup the PT and giving the team bonuses if they start the player up) 2:03 Ben Clemens : it’s a contingent thing, to me: in the worlds where McGonigle ends up being the kind of player worth doing something underhanded to get extra service time out of, you a)probably won’t get it b)could have gotten a draft pick if you weren’t so shady 2:03 Oaktown Blues : Ho...

Trey Yesavage profiles as a strong Rookie of the Year candidate, but he won’t have a chance to begin building his case in the near term. The 22-year-old Toronto Blue Jays right-hander landed on the injured list due to shoulder impingement and won’t be ready when the season gets underway later this week. His return is expected to come sooner rather than later — fingers are crossed throughout Canada — but for now, Yesavage is on the shelf. Five months ago he was turning heads in the World Series. With just six MLB outings under his belt — three in the regular season, and three across the ALDS and ALCS — Yesavage bedeviled LA batters with an array of high-riding heaters and diving splitters. He was especially dominant in Game 5, fanning a dozen Dodgers while allowing three baserunners and a lone run over seven frames. His meteoric rise and eye-popping postseason performances raised his public persona, but the Pottstown, Pennsylvania native hasn’t otherwise changed since being drafted ...

Brad Penner-Imagn Images It’s a great time to be a baseball fan. We just finished watching an exhilarating World Baseball Classic , which ended in a thrilling 3-2 Venezuela win over the United States , and we’re less than a week away from Opening Day. Part of the fun in the days leading up the start of the season is playing catchup with all the transactions that went down over the previous months. Sure, we all know that Kyle Tucker is a Dodger and Alex Bregman is a Cub, that Cody Bellinger returned to the Yankees and Pete Alonso joined the Orioles. We also don’t need to be told that Marcus Semien , Bo Bichette , and Luis Robert Jr. now play for the Mets, or that both Sonny Gray and Ranger Suarez slot in behind Garrett Crochet in the Red Sox rotation. But it can be hard to have a handle on how all these moves shape the outlook of teams across the league as we begin the season. The good news is that we at FanGraphs have been keeping tabs on everything throughout...

Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images 2026 Positional Power Rankings Intro C 1B 2B SS 3B LF CF RF DH Sometimes, we fail to appreciate the vastness of the mysterious forces behind projections systems. The data speak to each other and sometimes combine in unexpected ways to form unexpected outcomes. Regarding the question of how to rank each team’s designated hitters, what you see here is based not only on projections about player performances but well-informed speculation about how each team will line up. Put it all into the kettle and, well, shock of shocks, there’s an unexpected upset at no. 1 on this list. Actually, no, it’s Shohei Ohtani and the Dodgers again, by more than two wins. I don’t even know why I bothered setting up that gag, no one believed me, even for a second. 2026 Positional Power Rankings – DH 1. Dodgers Name PA AVG OBP SLG wOBA Bat BsR Fld WAR Shohei Ohtani 679 .282 .385 .599 .407 52.5 1...