"not worthy of its own thread" offseason thread

[MrCrowesGarden]

Jason Motte signed a minor league deal with the Cardinals. More closers!

[MinorLeagueGuy]

Jason Motte signed a minor league deal with the Cardinals. More closers!

Ooo that jab stings

[sighyoung]

Cards lose Rowan Wick to .... yup, Padres. Perennial poacher of put-aside prospects.

[Momo]

Billy Beane is witnessing Moneyball’s endgame: ‘We’re all valuing the same things’

This is kind of what I was saying a few days ago when I cited Cameron from Fangraphs hypothesizing that the sabermetric revolution had been “won.”

It seems like the last frontiers are probably in A) Deep, individual analytics like the Dodgers are doing, and B) Perhaps more psychometric research to get more from the “human” side of the game.

[ZigZagCardsFan]

I think there could still be advancements in mechanics like we've seen with a focus on launch angle. Maybe there's finally groundbreaking steps to keep pitchers healthier.

I'm a nerd and baseball allows me to nerd out like no other. I'm excited to see these continuing advancements.

[Hoot45]

It seems like the last frontiers are probably in A) Deep, individual analytics like the Dodgers are doing, and B) Perhaps more psychometric research to get more from the “human” side of the game.

The Cardinals invested in this over a year ago too. Here's a quote from MLB.com about it:

By bringing all of these areas under one umbrella, the Cardinals envisioned the potential for a competitive advantage. In the same way sabermetrics once changed the landscape of player evaluation, the Cards saw the creation of a performance department as baseball's potential next frontier.

This department recently was credited with encouraging the team to start spring training an hour later so players could sleep more. That's kind of a lame example but I mention it just because the department was in the news lately.

[Momo]

The later Spring Training thing was a good idea. The next step would seem to obviously seem to be treating minor league players right. If they get access to better equipment, technology and living conditions, they’d probably be far less stressed and more likely to reach their potential.

[Momo]

I think there could still be advancements in mechanics like we've seen with a focus on launch angle. Maybe there's finally groundbreaking steps to keep pitchers healthier.

I'm a nerd and baseball allows me to nerd out like no other. I'm excited to see these continuing advancements.

I think launch angle probably falls in that “deep, individual analytics” idea I mentioned. Because something like launch angle isn’t just about elevating the ball or whatever, it’s about figuring out the elevation that your swing best responds to. Similarly, new research on sequencing or pitch usage isn’t just about everyone switching to one or the other pitch, it’s about fixing your problems (e.g. like with the Dodgers seemingly fixing Cingrani last year).

But yeah, it’s all pretty interesting and will be fascinating to see what the next “inefficiencies” are.

[Radbird]

[Tim]