Twinkie Town: Win now, Win later

[Willihammer]

I count 3 guys, not half.....unless you really think Hicks is a top 10 under 25 guy with a future......or you count Polanco last year, which seems a bit of a stretch....

Arcia, May, Santana, Hicks, Vargas.

 

If you want to pick nits, the "rookie" cutoff for pitchers is 50 innings so May is technically going to have his rookie season in 2015; he logged 45.2 last year. The other 4 will be sophomores (Hicks who will be in his 3rd year.)

[Mike Sixel]

If Santana and Nolasco work out, we will see 1 of May, Meyer or Berrios, assuming you still like Gibson and Hughes.....so should those be top prospects we can count one, while also counting on Gibson, Nolasco and Santana? That seems like double counting to me. 

[Mike Sixel]

Arcia, May, Santana, Hicks, Vargas.

 

If you want to pick nits, the "rookie" cutoff for pitchers is 50 innings so May is technically going to have his rookie season in 2015; he logged 45.2 last year. The other 4 will be sophomores (Hicks who will be in his 3rd year.)

 

so in your mind, Hicks is a top guy under 25? True, I missed one....the list was 12 long, 11 w/o Hicks. 

[Willihammer]

so in your mind, Hicks is a top guy under 25? True, I missed one....the list was 12 long, 11 w/o Hicks.

I was using Gunnar's list as an example, to make a point about who are the top young talent s in the entire system, including the MLB club. When you do that, I think you arrive at a different picture about where this club projects to be in the win curve the next few years because a good chunk of the talent has graduated.

[gunnarthor]

One has to look at where players are projected for WAR in 2015 when trying to determine if we are gaining enough to be competitive.  Even then, those are projections meaning what they should do, and doesn't account for players over and under-performing.   We also can't just assume every one who had a good WAR last year will maintain that and also expect improvements to make it show we've gained enough to have a chance at .500.  Can't look at last year's WARS and project them to next year. It's not really how it works and the guys at Fangraphs has stated this multiple times in chats and articles.  

 

I don't see how this team, with such a low amount of quality, experienced major leaguers, has a realistic chance for .500 this season.  If I'm reading Steamer projections right, for our 40 man, we're projected to a hair under 18 WAR for position players and a bit over 9.00 WAR from our pitching (and a bit over 6.00 if looking at at RA9-WAR). We may not have a lot of projected negative guys, but we have a lot hovering at zero and between zero and 1. That puts us in the low 70s win category

Well, sure, some players will regress (Santana would be a 6 WAR guy over a full season) and others are probably/hopefully better (Mauer).  Last year, Hughes and Gibson combined for 6 WAR.  One might go up and one might go down but I think they can combine for that or better this year.  And you can do that through the roster.  If Santana turns into a pumpkin at short, he isn't going to get 400 PA there - Escobar will take over.  If Nolasco doesn't improve, Meyer is taking over, etc.  The team has some real depth this year.  This probably deserves it's own thread (and WAR isn't the greatest stat) but this team looks to me a lot more like the 2001 Twins than they do to you.

[jimmer]

Well, sure, some players will regress (Santana would be a 6 WAR guy over a full season) and others are probably/hopefully better (Mauer).  Last year, Hughes and Gibson combined for 6 WAR.  One might go up and one might go down but I think they can combine for that or better this year.  And you can do that through the roster.  If Santana turns into a pumpkin at short, he isn't going to get 400 PA there - Escobar will take over.  If Nolasco doesn't improve, Meyer is taking over, etc.  The team has some real depth this year.  This probably deserves it's own thread (and WAR isn't the greatest stat) but this team looks to me a lot more like the 2001 Twins than they do to you.

I'm not sure I'd agree with the statement that 'WAR isn't the greatest stat' out there when trying to figure out how much value a player provided overall.  It certainly isn't perfect (which the guys who create it will be the first to say, especially when used improperly in discussions, which happens a lot) but I can't think of one better. It's why I used it and I'm guessing why you used it as well in your post earlier when trying to show how the team will likely be a .500 team.

 

I think this team is a year or two away from what the 2011 team is and, in regards to a couple of examples you put out there for depth,  Eduardo Escobar could very well have had a career year, and I'm not sure I'd count on that again.  If Nolasco falter, you say we have Meyer, who may end up being a very good pitcher but doesn't mean he would be this year. My issue isn't our depth so much as our lack of many actual proven good or proven better than good players overall.

 

BTW, in regards to pitchers WAR, Fangraphs is still using FIP as a main component (which is good), but they are adding pop ups into the WAR calculation as well.  So, we'll see some differences in how some pitchers are viewed.

[TheDean]

So you can get to that improved 10 WAR by simply subtracting some negative WAR away (basically they got 600 PA and -4 WAR from Morales, Parm, Colabello and Kubel last year).  So if Vargas is even a 1 WAR player at DH this year, that's a 5 WAR improvement.  Ervin Santana replaces the Correa/May starts last year (combined -1.0 WAR) and is a 2 WAR guy.  That's a 3 WAR swing.  etc, etc.  

 

Not sure exactly how it'll all add up, but I'm really hoping that somehow Hunter/Arcia is an improvement over Hammer/Arcia. The corners were just terrible last year...terrible! Overall, it could be basically net-zero on switching out Hunter and Willingham, but really hoping that the depth will be better. If either goes down for an extended period of time, I feel better about giving Rosario a chance or having flexibility in Schafer/Santana/Hicks than last year's "Outfield of DHs" experiment.

 

To be clear, it's still marginal depth, and not a point of confidence at all. I think the OF as a whole could really swing the predicted performance of the team by their over- or under-performance in the field and with the stick. IMO, the OF is the key to the team next year.