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The Statcast revolution in Major League Baseball is merely in its inchoate stages, as Yahoo Sports’ Jeff Passan details in a must-read piece.

“We’re in the third inning,” Tom Tango, one of the minds behind Statcast, told Passan.

Statcast, which MLB.com notes “is capable of measuring previously unquantifiable aspects of the game,” became available in each of the league’s stadiums in 2015 and is utilized by all 30 front offices. The system tracked 1,435,241 pitches last year, but it was only scratching the surface, writes Passan, who expects it “to fundamentally change how we consume baseball.”

Major League Baseball Advanced Media, otherwise known as BAM, introduced Statcast and is now working to release data that makes the sport easily understandable to the public in a way that sabermetrics don’t.

“What we’re trying to do is we want to make it relevant and relative,” said BAM CEO Bob Bowman, who’s among commissioner Rob Manfred’s closest advisers. “Relevant to what fans are watching right now and relative to other players and similar situations.”

Tango, Daren Willman and Mike Petriello are attempting to put together a Statcast-based Wins Above Replacement to measure players’ values better than the current iterations of WAR. The version Tango, Willman and Petriello could introduce would lay out exactly how much value each position player contributes as a hitter, defender and base runner and, per Passan, possibly grade players on a 1-to-100 scale.

“What will make our version of WAR intriguing,” Willman said, “is the way we’re going to make it accessible.”

Their latest attempt to measure defense comes in the form of Catch Probability, which Petriello unveiled Saturday on MLB.com in another highly recommended piece. Catch Probability uses a 0-100 percent scale to determine how catchable each tracked ball hit to the outfield is, and they’d eventually like to use it to judge infield defense.

“A 40 percent play and 80 percent play are very close,” Tango told Passan. “Less than a second of hangtime. Fifteen to 20 feet of positioning. At a single-play level, that’s where this thing is going to shine.”

Eventually, BAM would like to integrate Statcast’s data into every major league broadcast. So far, the league has gotten incredible bang for its buck from BAM, which began with investments of a couple million dollars from each franchise. Now, according to Passan, the league’s 30 clubs are worth at least $1 billion apiece because all own a stake in BAM.

In light of the recent arbitration hearing drama between the Yankees and reliever Dellin Betances, I remembered a three-part series B.J. Rains did for MLBTR four years ago that may be of interest.  In a series called Players Reflect On Arbitration Hearings, B.J. spoke to Dan Uggla, Jeff Mathis, and Kyle Lohse about their first-hand experiences.  Check out the full articles, but as you can see from these excerpts, arbitration hearings affect players differently.

• Uggla: “It didn’t bother me at all. It’s just a process, the business side of it.” 
• Mathis: “There’s stuff that goes on in that room that I wouldn’t suggest anybody experience or be a part of. … You don’t want to be a part of anything like that.”
• Lohse: “It’s not a pleasant thing.  It’s hard to sit there and listen to the lawyer say how bad you are when the GM is sitting right there and you feel like he fed them the info to talk about how bad you are yet they still want you.”

To wrap up a quiet day in the transactional world, here are a few interesting links from around the game worth a look:

• Ben Badler of Baseball America provides a breakdown of the recent MLB international amateur showcase. Many of the players on hand already have lined up deals, says Badler, with some even arguing that the event prods players and teams to reach earlier agreements than they would otherwise. In addition to infielder Wander Franco, who the Rays are expected to sign with this year’s biggest July 2 bonus, Badler says that catcher Daniel Flores was highly impressive. Flores has the upside of becoming a top-flight receiver, per the report; the Rangers are expected to land him.
• Shifting remains an intriguing and evolving element of today’s game, but Eno Sarris of Fangraphs analyzes whether it may have reached a saturation point. Hitters have responded with increased lift and more opposite-field groundballs, he says. And there are indications that teams are stretching the concept right to the edge of usefulness. While it’s not quite to a “high-water mark” yet, Sarris posits, that point may be on the horizon.
• As Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports writes, the league is looking into changes to the game ball that would increase its tackiness. The hope, it seems, is to avoid some of the preparation required to get a baseball ready for action — and to forego the need for pitchers to resort to less-than-authorized means of obtaining their preferred grip.
• Meanwhile, MLB and the player’s association continue to discuss ongoing changes and address the implications of the new CBA. In his latest comments, relayed by Evan Woodberry of MLive.com, MLBPA chief Tony Clark rejects the notion that the new agreement depressed player salaries in free agency this winter, saying it’s far too soon to evaluate. He also offered some thoughts on the arbitration process, noting that the impact of various statistics can change without any real warning or explanation from arb panels (which only decide on a number, without setting for their reasoning). “It’s always an interesting back-and-forth, and in some ways you’re throwing darts with what you think is resonating,” he said. “Introductions of new concepts and ideas always happen. Making a one-year determination as to whether or not you have to blow up the entire system doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. We’ll have to see how things progress moving forward.”

The NBA trade deadline is just 16 days away, and our sister site Hoops Rumors is on top of all the latest news and rumors for each of the league’s 30 teams.

Will the Carmelo Anthony era come to an end in New York, given the trade rumors surrounding the Knicks star? Will the Sixers clear their logjam at center by trading Jahlil Okafor and/or Nerlens Noel? Will the Magic trade Serge Ibaka less than eight months after acquiring him in a draft-day blockbuster? Is this the year that Danny Ainge and the Celtics finally cash in some of their assets to make a major trade?  Bookmark Hoops Rumors today, and follow us on Twitter @hoopsrumors.

This weekend is absolute madness in the NFL world.  By 3pm CT today, all 32 teams will have cut their rosters down from 75 to 53, meaning that more than 700 transactions will take place.  Luckily, you can keep up with every cut and every trade by following @pfrumors on Twitter and staying tuned to ProFootballRumors.com.

The day is already off to a huge start with the Vikings’ acquisition of Sam Bradford from the Eagles. On Friday, the Titans’ new regime cleaned house, getting rid of notables like wide receiver Justin Hunter, versatile athlete Dexter McCluster, and running backs David Cobb and Bishop Sankey.  In San Francisco, Colin Kaepernick is making headlines for unexpected reasons, but it sounds like the Niners are leaning towards keeping him on the roster.  In non-deadline news, Patriots defensive lineman Rob Ninkovich was slapped with a four-game suspension for violating the league’s policy on banned substances.

There will be a dizzying amount of news today concerning your favorite team.  In fact, we often see big names get cut on deadline day, and some moves can even impact your fantasy team.  Don’t miss on a single piece of news – follow @pfrumors on Twitter today!

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

With August nearing an end, it’s last call for teams to add players from outside their organizations who’ll be eligible to play in the postseason. It’s also time we put in a call for another mailbag. Submit your questions via email to mlbtrmailbag@gmail.com.

Wondering about final roster tweaks? Questions about arbitration decisions that are right around the corner? Have thoughts on how the free agent market might be shaping up? Send ’em our way!

It has been a while since we checked in on the 2017 vesting options that will be decided by the 2016 stat sheets. With all quiet elsewhere, it seemed like an opportune time for an update:

• Coco Crisp ($13MM option vests at 550 plate appearances or 130 games played in 2016): It has been an up and down year for the veteran, who currently owns an adequate but ultimately just-below-average .235/.301/.406 batting line on the year. He has reached 420 plate appearances in 98 games, so it would take something approaching everyday playing time for the option to vest. Crisp recently accused the A’s of tamping down his playing time to avoid just that possibility. From an outside perspective, it does seem that there are legitimate reasons unrelated to the vesting clause to justify less-than-regular action for Crisp — he hasn’t played all that well and the team reasonably hopes to see younger players in action — though the A’s undoubtedly have that consideration in mind as well. Regardless of the precise reason, it’s all but inconceivable to think that Oakland will allow that stack of cash to become guaranteed.
• Matt Holliday ($17MM option vests with Top 10 finish in MVP voting): This one was always a longshot to vest, and it became increasingly apparent over the year that Holliday was posting a solid — but hardly MVP worthy — campaign. Still, his recent injury put the final nail in the coffin for all but theoretical chances at landing inside the top ten. Accordingly, the Cards will face a difficult decision on the veteran outfielder, who is still an above-average hitter but has shown signs of decline.
• Chris Iannetta ($6MM option vests with 100 games started in 2016): Iannetta’s option was trending strongly towards vesting when we last looked, but things have changed with the re-emergence of Mike Zunino in Seattle. Iannetta would need to start 22 games to pick up the $6MM guarantee, but he has only appeared in seven contests thus far in the month of August. Iannetta has also seen his production drop; he currently owns a .218/.310/.343 batting line. Whether or not Seattle has any interest in picking up that tab remains to be seen, but it probably won’t make it to the club’s books by operation of the vesting provision.
• Yusmeiro Petit ($3MM option vests with 80 innings pitched in 2016): The likeliest path to this option vesting was for a need to arise to utilize Petit as a temporary rotation piece. While he has made one spot start and some other lengthy appearances, though, Petit has only compiled 55 frames to date — making it quite unlikely that the clause will vest. (Realistically, it would probably take multiple rotation injuries.) That being said, he has done everything the Nats hoped he would, carrying a 3.27 ERA with 6.7 K/9 and 2.1 BB/9, and still seems rather likely to have the option exercised regardless.
• CC Sabathia ($25MM option vests if he does not end season on DL with shoulder injury or miss 45+ games in 2016 due to shoulder injury): Sabathia’s season has taken a turn for the worst since the last time we checked in about two months ago. His results are looking more like those of disappointing recent years than the bounceback first half. But Sabathia has still shown no signs of shoulder problems, so with less than 45 days left to go on the season, it doesn’t seem there’s any way for the Yanks to get out from under this big tab.
• Kurt Suzuki ($6MM option vests with 485 plate appearances in 2016): The 32-year-old has 303 plate appearances of league-average offensive production, which bodes reasonably well for his free agent case but doesn’t set him up for another year in Minnesota by way of the vesting clause. It is all but official: Suzuki is headed to the open market.

As noted in the original update, both Nick Swisher and Michael Bourn had vesting options for the 2017 season as well, but those options were negated when each was released from the four-year contracts they initially signed with the Indians.

The August trade market is as tricky to navigate for observers as it is for teams, so we thought now would be an opportune time to re-start the MLBTR mailbag. You can submit your questions about team needs, possible trade targets, and even the offseason to come by shooting an email to mlbtrmailbag@gmail.com.

While we can’t get to all the inquiries that we receive, rest assured we read them all and do our best to answer those of greatest interest. We’ll run our responses tomorrow, and you can keep a look out on Mondays for future iterations of the mailbag.