Free For All Friday #26

Hello and welcome to Free For All Friday.

Until yesterday’s vote to approve the A’s move to Las Vegas, it was a fairly quiet week in baseball news. Yesterday, paid subscribers received a newsletter with my thoughts on the A’s ballpark news. Otherwise, I’ve tried to leave your inboxes uncluttered from news about trades of minor league players, wild speculation on where Shohei Ohtani will sign, or rumors about how every single MLB team is looking to add a frontline starter to their rotation.

Sure, the MVP, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year, and Manager of the Year awards were all announced this week. But if you don’t need me to tell you that. That information is readily available on MLB.com and ESPN. What you do need me for is to bring to your attention, in case you missed it, is Shohei Ohtani and his adorable dog at the moment Ohtani learns that he is the unanimous pick as the 2023 AL MVP.

The chill vibe is real.

2023 Rookies made a big impact

The 2023 Rookies of the Year Corbin Carroll (National League) and Gunnar Henderson (American League) were unanimous choices for those awards. You can see how each Baseball Writers Association of American writer voted for these awards. National League vote is here and American League is here.

Given that each award was unanimous, I was curious how strong the 2023 rookie class was as a whole and how it compared to the rookie classes over the last 10 seasons. Turns out, 2023’s rookie position players had the second best season since 2014, as measured by fWAR. The rookie starting pitchers in 2023 didn’t fare quite as well, when compared to their counterparts from 2014-2022.

Below is a table showing how many qualified rookie position players played in MLB in 2023, their cumulative fWAR, their average fWAR, and the highest fWAR among those players. Players with a ** after their name won the Rookie of the Year award that season.

As you can see, only the 2015 class of rookie position players had a higher average fWAR than the 2023 class—even with Aaron Judge’s monster 8.8 fWAR in his rookie season of 2017.

Here’s the table with the same info for rookie starting pitchers from 2014-2023.

The only starter on the list who won a Rookie of the Year award is Jacob deGrom. His rookie season was the strongest for rookie starting pitchers over the last 10 seasons, again, as measured by fWAR. Other rookie starters that season? Marcus Stroman, Colin McHugh, Kevin Gausman, and Kyle Hendricks, among others. A strong rookie class with pitchers who’ve continued to contribute a high level.

Braves and White Sox make 6-player trade

Michael Soroka is on the above table. He recorded the highest starter fWAR in 2019. Yesterday the Braves traded Soroka and four other players to the White Sox for reliever Aaron Bummer. Seems odd, no?

Bill Baer at the Substack newsletter Baer In Mind breaks it all down in today’s free newsletter. Bill is a smart baseball writer—even for a Phillies fan. Check out his analysis.

How to understand trade rumors

There are two reasons I don’t spend time in this newsletter writing about trade and free-agent signing rumors. One, the rumors change quickly and since this is a thrice-weekly newsletter, by the time I give you my analysis of the rumor, it’s been replaced by a new rumor. Second, MLBTradeRumors.com exists and does a superb job of quickly reporting on and analyzing trade and free agent rumors. At this time of year, I have the MLBTR tab open on my laptop and refresh it every hour, at least. If you want to obsess about off season moves like I do, feel free to follow my lead!

I think most of you know this, but a reminder if you are going to obsess about these rumors like I do. The baseball reporters who chase rumors get their information from one of three sources: players, agents, higher ups in each team’s front office. Rumors about where a free agent might sign are largely driven by that free agent’s agent. The goal of these rumors is to create the impression that a player is highly valued and that a lot of teams are “in on him.” That drives up the price for that free agent, which is financially beneficial to the player and his agent.

Reporters who are good at creating that kind of media environment then get more rumors fed to him (or her, but mostly him). It’s the reporter’s reward for helping the player and agent make a lot of money. Jon Heyman of the New York Post is the best example of this symbiotic relationship.

Be careful out there. And try not to get your hopes up too high that your favorite team is “in on” Shohei Ohtani.

That’s for all for this week. Hopefully, we’ll have some hot stove action to talk about next week.

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