FanGraphs Weekly Mailbag: April 18, 2026

What-ifs are a central a part of being a baseball fan. We love to think about how in another way issues may’ve turned out if a star participant hadn’t gotten damage, or if a workforce had signed one free agent as an alternative of one other. Some what-ifs are the stuff of legend, just like the fabled night time within the late Nineteen Forties when, throughout a drunken dinner with Tom Yawkey at Toots Shor’s Midtown Manhattan joint, Yankees proprietor Dan Topping almost traded Joe DiMaggio to the Purple Sox for Ted Williams. Others aren’t revealed till a long time later, like when Barry Bonds mentioned on the Opening Night time Netflix broadcast final month that he would’ve performed for the Yankees as an alternative of the Giants if George Steinbrenner hadn’t given him a take-it-or-leave-it supply.

All of us have our personal private picks, too. Listed here are a couple of of mine: What if the New York Metropolis newspapers hadn’t gone on strike in 1978? What if Eric Gregg hadn’t been the house plate umpire for Livan Hernandez’s begin in Sport 5 of the 1997 NLCS? What if Dottie Hinson hadn’t dropped the ball, or Jimmy Dugan had simply laid off the booze? A number of the most important what-ifs might’ve had an enormous influence on the world past baseball. What if the Black Sox hadn’t thrown the 1919 World Collection? What if Curt Flood hadn’t challenged the reserve clause? What if George W. Bush had been named commissioner of baseball?

We gained’t be analyzing any of the above what-ifs on this week’s mailbag, however three of the 4 questions we’re answering under are rooted in an alternate actuality, one during which Mookie Betts was at all times a shortstop, Ford Frick didn’t run Invoice Veeck out of baseball, and a beginning pitcher was precisely league common at all the pieces besides throwing strikes. The lone non-hypothetical query, which is the place we’ll start, seems to be at whether or not groups have extra success after they hit a grand slam than after they rating no less than 4 runs with out one. However first, I’d wish to remind you that this mailbag is unique to FanGraphs Members. In the event you aren’t but a Member and wish to maintain studying, you possibly can join a Membership right here. It’s the easiest way to each expertise the positioning and help our employees, and it comes with a bunch of different nice advantages. Additionally, if you happen to’d wish to ask a query for an upcoming mailbag, ship me an electronic mail at mailbag@fangraphs.com.