Morning Mound Visit: sabermetrics news - 7/27/18

Sports Illustrated | Emma Baccellieri: Three position players have pitched in games in just the last week, and none in extra inning games. While this was usually employed as a last-resort, managers are seriously thinking about using position players as a real strategy, because if you have a 2% win probability, it makes a lot of sense to save the actual pitcher.

FanGraphs | Dan Szymborski: The Orioles have already sold off Manny Machado and Zach Britton for decent returns, but what about the rest of their tradeable players? If Adam Jones, Kevin Gausman, Dylan Bundy, and Jonathan Schoop all left, like in the proposals he posits, then you could accelerate their rebuild significantly.

Baseball Prospectus | Matthew Trueblood: Joakim Soria is a Brewer now, but one of the most interesting things about him as of late is a new arm slot he developed. That, combined with increased usage of the slider, means he has reinvented himself just as Milwaukee gears up for a playoff push.

The Ringer | Zach Kram: Should the Nationals trade Bryce Harper? Even though they’ve had a dismal season thus far it looks like a stretch, even though it would be very interesting to imagine Harper in the heart of the Astros’ lineup, for example.