Do the Twins have a potential winner here?

[Willihammer]

Dave Cameron wrote a piece on fangraphs about the Manfred comment that baseball needed more runs (tl;dr it doesn't). In the piece was a nice little graph showing the growth of 3 true outcomes in baseball over the last 115 years. The trend is clear.

http://cdn.fangraphs.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/BBKHBP.png

Therefore, with fewer balls in play, team fielding is a smaller component of run prevention than ever.

Problem is, the Twins are behind the curve. Just 25.6% of opponent PAs ended with a TTO in 2014. That would have been average for a team way back in 1993 or so. Today, the mean is 30.3% (and growing).

 

Until the Twins catch up, fielding defense is going to play a larger part in overall run prevention than it would on other teams.

[jimmer]

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=878

 

Here's a good read.

[Dr. Evil]

Why do I feel I should write another "letter" to Terry Ryan?

 

Can it be so damned obvious what the single, #1 problem and weakness of this team is?

 

And it STILL hasn't been addressed in a logical, acceptable manner?

Maybe they are thinking that Escobar at short and Santana in center is a decent starting point for the season and then go from there when Buxton or Rosario is ready. Both Escobar and Santana seem to be in our top 9 players from last year. If Escobar continues to impress as he did last year, by the time the trade deadline came he could be considered another teams starting shortstop in a trade. We slide Buxton/Rosario to center and Santana to SS and away we go. If Escobar is in a utility role to start the season, maybe he doesn't get the chance to appear to be the real deal for other teams. Just a thought.

[Dave T]

I mentioned it, without naming names in Post # 18

 

 

Hughes had 6.1 fWAR in 2014, and an ERA+ of 112.  HIs previous best full season SP totals at NY were 2.5 fWAR and ERA+ of 103.  Even if he regresses closer to the 2015 ZiPS projection of 4.0 fWAR or Steamer projection of 2.5 fWAR., Hughes will still have a really good year, but might be perceived as "disappointing" after his career year in 2014.  

 

I think you nailed it, if anything, the OF defense might be worse than 2014, which can't be good for Hughes' numbers.  I look for another "bounceback" year from Hughes in 2016, when the OF defense...  might... finally... be above league average. 

 

 

IMO there is no friggin way that Hunter could be worse than Hammer in RF.  I am scratching my head a bit about CF. Santana can cover more ground than the Hicks/Schafer platoon, but he wasn't always effective at a) getting to where the ball was hit, or [] catching it once he got there.  OF defense remains a weak spot, no doubt about it.

[jokin]

 

IMO there is no friggin way that Hunter could be worse than Hammer in RF.  I am scratching my head a bit about CF. Santana can cover more ground than the Hicks/Schafer platoon, but he wasn't always effective at a) getting to where the ball was hit, or catching it once he got there.  OF defense remains a weak spot, no doubt about it.

 

The problem is...

 

that Arica is being shipped over to train on-the-job in LF.  Expect semi-disastrous results.

 

...And that Santana is still considered a possible acceptable alternative when/if the "platoon" fails, tells you all you need to know about the situation in CF.

 

As far as Torii goes, think Willie Mays playing for New York... but with the NY Mets.  When you near 40, there is an established pattern that inevitably, everything goes...  and fast.  I think last season when Detroit played Minnesota, we quite sadly caught early notices of Hunter's coming "senior moments."

 

http://i.imgur.com/zH5YLR4.gif

[bird]

I don't think you are, at least based on his fairly feeble "defense of the defense" in relation to the press conference at the Hunter signing.

Using Ryan's words from that single press conference is the epitome of word-parsing.

[jokin]

Using Ryan's words from that single press conference is the epitome of word-parsing.

 

Or merely relating Ryan's actual thoughts on the matter, which is exactly what he did in that particular case.

[jimmer]

Or merely relating Ryan's actual thoughts on the matter, which is exactly what he did in that particular case.

'In losing 90-plus games each year from 2011-2014 the Twins' defense was 98 runs below average according to Ultimate Zone Rating (ranks them 28th), 107 runs below average according to Plus/Minus, and 115 runs below average according to Defensive Runs Saved (that ranks them 24th). (Overall ranked 26th.)

 

Twins scouts watched Hunter for 30-35 games and graded him average or better defensively, so that's what Ryan and the front office relied on rather than trusting the defensive numbers that all agree he was somewhere between bad and horrendous. By the way, Hunter had about two balls hit to him per game this year, so evaluating his defense based on watching 30-35 games is like evaluating a hitter based on watching 60-70 at-bats.

 

Ryan repeatedly saying the Twins need to pitch better and repeatedly denying the Twins' defense has been awful is a weird, frustrating disconnect. Their outfield defense rated particularly poorly, yet when asked about that Ryan scoffs at the numbers and insists guys like Josh Willingham were perfectly adequate. He also scoffed at the numbers all rating Hunter as 15-25 runs below average during the past two seasons'

 

 

http://aarongleeman.com/tag/eduardo-nunez/

 

Stuff put in parenthesis is me just putting the info into league context rankings.

[USAFChief]

'In losing 90-plus games each year from 2011-2014 the Twins' defense was 98 runs below average according to Ultimate Zone Rating (ranks them 28th), 107 runs below average according to Plus/Minus, and 115 runs below average according to Defensive Runs Saved (that ranks them 24th). (Overall ranked 26th.)

 

Twins scouts watched Hunter for 30-35 games and graded him average or better defensively, so that's what Ryan and the front office relied on rather than trusting the defensive numbers that all agree he was somewhere between bad and horrendous. By the way, Hunter had about two balls hit to him per game this year, so evaluating his defense based on watching 30-35 games is like evaluating a hitter based on watching 60-70 at-bats.

 

Ryan repeatedly saying the Twins need to pitch better and repeatedly denying the Twins' defense has been awful is a weird, frustrating disconnect. Their outfield defense rated particularly poorly, yet when asked about that Ryan scoffs at the numbers and insists guys like Josh Willingham were perfectly adequate. He also scoffed at the numbers all rating Hunter as 15-25 runs below average during the past two seasons'

 

 

http://aarongleeman.com/tag/eduardo-nunez/

 

Stuff put in parenthesis is me just putting the info into league context rankings.

At two chances per game, wouldn't advanced defensive metrics be pretty questionable as well?

 

Particularly those that estimate two balls per game cost 15-25 runs?

[mikelink45]

Best last place finish in any division!  Who could ask for anything more?

[ashbury]

Best last place finish in any division!  Who could ask for anything more?

That would be progress, of a sort, I suppose.  The best thing they can do is win as many as they can, and if the stars are aligned against them in some way such as a stacked division, well that's baseball.  In the meantime you'll have been treated to a high level of ball being played during the season.

[TheLeviathan]

True, but pitching has waaaaaaaaaaayyyyyy more impact. It's not even close.

 

Guess posts are disappearing.  In any case, it may be true that pitchers have a great deal of control, but defense has a very real and a perceptual impact on run prevention.

 

I think you and the organization might be too dismissive of the impact.

[glunn]

Moderator note -- three posts had to be deleted from this thread because people were being inflammatory and/or disrespectful of others. Such disrespect/squabbling undermines intelligent debate.

 

We are all Twins fans and we can all learn from each other.  Feel free to debate the relative importance of pitching versus defense and whether Escobar needs to be in the lineup, but please follow TD policy.  http://twinsdaily.com/topic/8228-twins-daily-comment-policy-latest-revision-september-2013/

 

 Most people are doing a good job following the rules and the moderators have been instructed to crack down on repeat offenders.  Please do not become a repeat offender.

[jimmer]

 

 

Elsewhere, Danny Santana was actually league average in his time in CF, according to B-Ref.  

Fangraphs had him with a -5.4 UZR in CF and for UZR/150 it was -12.2. They did say he was at zero runs saved, so not in the negative in that regard.  I don't think he has had enough time there for the metrics to really tell us much (less than 60 games worth of innings), and hopefully since he's an IF and not an OF, we won't have to find out what a larger sample size tells us. To me, he didn't look good out there, but he sure tried, which I like to give him credit for.  I wouldn't expect a guy who played IF his whole life to go out there and play an exceptional OF.

[DocBauer]

Though I like and respect Escobar, and think what he did last season was no fluke, Santana simply has more explosive athletic talent. With more consistency defensively, he absolutely figures to be the more explosive offensive player with more range and "big play" ability.

 

But if CF continues to be a quagmire, and I don't see any reason or optimism why it should change any time soon, then I'm OK with Santana out there again as the best overall option with Escobar back as the primary SS. I don't think Santa is great in CF, but I don't think he's terrible either. And he actually seemed to work hard and show improvement throughout the season.

[stringer bell]

I agree with Doc about 2015 and I would say that Santana progressed a long way last year from his early starts in center.  Yes, I believe he was league average by the end of the season and I think that if he were out there this year, he would progress beyond that. 

 

Also, I think the jury is still out on both shortstops.  Escobar had a fine year with the bat and played well in the field.  I am not sure he will sustain the hitting.  Santana played at an All-Star level as a hitter (for a SS), but we didn't get to see enough of him in the field to judge whether he could handle being a full-time SS.  Both are candidates for offensive regression.  This season should tell quite a bit.

[DocBauer]

Very optimistic on both kids Stringer. I know there is potential regression, there always is. But when I see a young player perform the way these two did, for the most part, over and over, week to week and month to month for a season...even when I kept waiting for and expecting the other shoe to drop...and they just simply continue to perform, I start to think more about progression and not regression.

 

But for them, and the team, I really want more overall competition. And by that, I mean the CF/OF situation.

 

But isn't it kind of funny that most of this "do we have a team that can actual win something/be above .500" seems to be centering on this particular topic?