Mailbag Monday: James Outman's ceiling, pitching concerns + a pitch clock strategy from the fans
Answering questions from paid subscribers
Happy Monday, everyone!
An interesting week is in the book for the Dodgers. They swept the Rockies and then got absolutely destroyed by the DBacks. Hey, it happens.
I’m not panicking…… yet.
Every Monday, I’ll answer questions from my paid subscribers. If you’d like to ask a question for next week’s mailbag, upgrade your subscription today!
Bob Lowe — My biggest hunch entering season? We needed one more veteran pitcher. Either resign an Anderson or get a Stripling. The bottom of the rotation is subpar.
I think the Dodgers definitely could have benefited from adding another starter. Remember, they were in on Justin Verlander and it sounded like they were pretty serious. I also don’t think the Dodgers were expecting to have injuries to Tony Gonsolin or Ryan Pepiot this early in the season. Like, literally before they even played a game.
Were there going to be injuries at some point? Yes. But I think the Dodgers were expecting Gavin Stone and Bobby Miller to both be ready by the time there was an opening in the rotation. Having to rely on Michael Grove through the first month of the season is not an ideal situation. I think they’ll be fine once Gonsolin returns, whenever that is.
Morgan Gill — When do you expect Buehler to return? I hear people saying out of the bullpen in Oct. I would personally rather have him fully healthy in 2024 with no restrictions, but we will see!
If I had to guess, I don’t think we’ll see Buehler pitch in 2023. He could certainly return at the end of the season, but that’s assuming everything goes according to plan and he’s fully healthy.
If he does return by the end of the season, I think we could see him out of the bullpen potentially, as I’m not sure if his arm will be fully built up to start games for the Dodgers. Could you imagine Buehler as a high-leverage reliever in October? That would be fun.
I’m with you, though. At the end of the day, I just want him to be healthy for the future, so if that means not seeing him until 2024 I’m totally okay with that.
Rocío A — With the improvements the Dbacks and Padres have made to their teams and the schedule having less divisional games, do you see potential for one of these other teams stun the Dodgers and take the West?
I think the Padres winning the division is more likely, but don’t sleep on these DBacks. All offseason I’ve been hyping them up. I’ve been saying they could be a Wild Card team as early this season and they’ll be a problem for the Dodgers in the future. With less divisional games, every matchup against the Padres and DBacks will be that much more important moving forward.
LifesEZ — Early in the season with still wild dreams, teams can do amazing things. With about every Dodger Pitcher getting their clocked a little cleaned, it looks more to me that the Dodgers ran into a hot team more likely than having a failing pitching staff. The pitching staff did have ugly moments, but a hot team amplifies that. I would like to hear your perspective?
The Dodgers’ pitching staff the last three games was as bad of a stretch I’ve seen from the Dodgers in quite some time. It seemed like every player that threw a pitch for the Dodgers was awful. I want to see how they do against the Giants before I truly judge them.
I think it was in part to Arizona just getting insanely hot at the right time. We have to realize that the DBacks have a solid lineup. It was just one of those stretches where everything hit the fan at once. I expect the Dodgers to bounce back in San Francisco over these next few days….. at least I hope so.
The Giants strike out at a higher rate than any other team in baseball, but their team OPS of .802 is the fifth best in baseball. It will be an interesting test for LA these next three days.
Jeff Synder — Trying to put a positive spin on things, Outman seems to be a keeper. What do you think his ceiling could be?
James Outman has been better than advertised, which just seems crazy considering how high his expectations were entering the season. I think Outman has the chance to hit 25+ homers a season while also playing Gold Glove defense in the outfield as well.
His strikeout rate is still concerning, as he’s striking out in nearly 1/3 of his plate appearances. If he can bring that number down to the mid 20’s, he can be a yearly All-Star player.
Tom — Let’s get Stone up here and see what he’s got. When do they cut CT3 and move on to Busch?
The Dodgers likely want to let Gavin Stone get a few more starts in OKC. We need to remember he’s only made eight starts in Triple-A so far. I think he’ll be ready by June or so.
Dodgers would never cut CT, but giving Michael Busch a shot is a realistic possibility, at least I think. With Busch, it just feels like a “I’ll believe it when I see it” with him in regards to actually playing for the Dodgers. He’s been one of the best hitters in all of the minors for the Dodgers for multiple years now. He’s hitting .333 in OKC this season.
There’s just no room for him. I wish there was, as I think he’d be a valuable asset for the Dodgers. The only way we see him is if there’s an injury to one of the infielders. If they all stay healthy, I just see no way he gets promoted unfortunately.
Travis — It's early, but ultimately, how do you see the OF situation playing out? There are only so many ABs to go around and it feels like the Dodgers have 1 too many OFs on the roster. When Betts plays 2B, it takes Vargas to the bench. Outman should play and continue to develop at the big league level. That leaves Heyward, Peralta, Thompson and Taylor for one spot. Taylor is also an infield backup. Thompson is RH. That leaves Heyward and Peralta fighting for ABs. Heyward looks good now, but in a month it could be reversed. Your thoughts on this shakes out?
Like you said, it’s early. It’s tough to really predict how things shape out. Personally, I think Outman has earned an every day opportunity, but I get why the Dodgers want to rotate guys. Outman has only five plate appearances against LHP this season, but he’s turned that into a 2.800 OPS. I think he’s earned more chances.
Outside of Trayce’s incredible 3-homer games, he’s been pretty bad this season. He’s gone 1-for-11 since that night with five strikeouts. Meanwhile, David Peralta has been LA’s worst hitter this season as he owns an OPS+ of 12. I get it, you got to get those guys at bats but things have been pretty underwhelming on their ends.
Jason Heyward has been the biggest surprise for me as he looks like the hitter he was a decade ago. But again, it’s only been 16 plate appearances so who knows how the rest of the season shapes out.
I agree, it feels like they have too many outfielders. I wish they had an infield spot available for Michael Busch instead. Honestly, after going through each player, I have no idea how it’s going to shape out. My guess is that the Dodgers are just going to continue what they’ve been doing. They’ll throw guys out there based on matchups, whether they perform or not.
How will this continue to work out? Well, your guess is as good as mine!
Travis — I think with the bullpen usage against Arizona that the Dodgers will make a move to bring up a fresh arm tonight. Grove seems to be the best candidate to send down (maybe Jackson?). But if it's Grove then he has to be down for a specific time (barring injury). Is it possible he gets sent down, they bring up another arm for the next few days then turn to someone else for his next turn in the rotation? Stone has had 1 bad start and 1 good start. While I would love to see him up, I doubt they do it this soon. So who would be the guy to take that next start? Miller is not at AAA (last I saw). Any bullpen arms down at AAA that you think could be called up?
This will be something to follow. The Dodgers used a lot of arms yesterday and they’ll need a fresh arm. The good thing is that they have Julio Urias on the mound tonight, but I think they’ll need to make some sort of move.
They could send Grove down like you mentioned, or maybe Jackson. If they were to call up a reliever, Victor Gonzalez seems like the best option. He’s on the 40-man roster and has looked solid in OKC to start the season. Another option would be Justin Bruihl. If the Dodgers were to send down Grove, they could save Jackson and use him in Grove’s place this weekend.
Nick M — This is a question that was discussed on the last episode of Effectively Wild, but I was interested to hear if you had a take on it.
Basically, someone noticed that at a moment during one of the Dodgers/Angels spring training games when Kershaw was struggling with the pitch timer (he had a violation and then gave up two hits), a beach ball fell on the field, the pitch timer was paused while they got it off, and Kershaw ended up getting an extra 30 seconds or so to compose himself and get out of the inning. Obviously, this was a no-stakes exhibition game, but it raised the question of whether or not there could be some strategic advantage to this kind of thing in actual high leverage moments.
Is there a world where a team could manufacture breaks from the pitch timer with on field interruptions in big moments - e.g. a conveniently timed beach ball on the field or something that similarly wouldn't draw suspicion as an intentional disruption.
Or, even if the teams themselves aren't in on it, do you think that fans acting on their own might be tempted to try to help out their pitcher by accidentally bumping a beach ball onto the field when they think he needs a break?
This would be some next-level fandom. I don’t think we see anything like this happen, but it would be some sort of crazy strategy if it were to work!
I'm going to do to a game a prove you wrong Blake, I will throw stuff on the field to help Kersh out! haha
As always, good stuff! 👍🏽