Article: Trending (3/31): Setting the Roster

[John Bonnes]

Jeremy, your note on Palka prompted me to look up when else we've talked about him on TD. Do you remember you talked him up as a possible draft choice by the Twins in 2013?

 

http://twinsdaily.com/articles.html/_/minnesota-twins-news/minnesota-twins-minor-leagues/draft-board-v30-420-r1383

 

And sure enough, here he is....

[jay]

 

This gets repeated a lot, but I'm not sure if it is particularly true.  Take a look at Ortiz's hit locations and performance scompared to a non-Fenway LH power hitter like, say, Jim Thome.

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/split.cgi?id=ortizda01&year=Career&t=b#hitlo

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/split.cgi?id=thomeji01&year=Career&t=b#hitlo

 

Thome had basically the same percentage of at-bats going to the opposite field (~17%), and was actually a better opposite field hitter than Ortiz relative to their overall performance (tOPS+ of 163, versus Ortiz's 99).  Their career home/away tOPS+ marks are virtually identical too.

 

Maybe there is some more granular data that suggests Ortiz took special advantage of the Green Monster over his career, but I haven't seen that case made yet

 

I don't think a one-to-one comparison to Jim Thome is anything to prove it's not true. That's like saying that comparing Ortiz to Bonds makes Ortiz a bad power hitter.

 

In the last 20 years, you can find 338 players who went to the opposite field at least 500 times. Jim Thome is #2 in wRC+ from that list. Ortiz is #25.  

 

Despite his whining, success hitting to the opposite field has been essential for Papi.

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=500&type=1&season=2015&month=23&season1=1995&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

I don't think a one-to-one comparison to Jim Thome is anything to prove it's not true. That's like saying that comparing Ortiz to Bonds makes Ortiz a bad power hitter.

 

In the last 20 years, you can find 338 players who went to the opposite field at least 500 times. Jim Thome is #2 in wRC+ from that list. Ortiz is #25.  

 

Despite his whining, success hitting to the opposite field has been essential for Papi.

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=500&type=1&season=2015&month=23&season1=1995&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

I obviously wasn't trying to completely disprove it with a one-to-one comparison.  I just picked the Thome comparison at random as an illustration to cast some doubt on the theory.

 

Frankly I think the burden of proof lies with Seth and others who constantly trot out this assertion that Ortiz's success took special advantage of the ability to go the other way that the Twins tried to teach him.  Have you seen any evidence to support that?  We can toss my little Thome exercise out the window if you like, but that doesn't mean there is any more evidence to the support it.  Without evidence, it just sounds like creating our own sour grapes to combat the perceived sour grapes from Ortiz on the subject.

[Jeremy Nygaard]

Jeremy, your note on Palka prompted me to look up when else we've talked about him on TD. Do you remember you talked him up as a possible draft choice by the Twins in 2013?

 

http://twinsdaily.com/articles.html/_/minnesota-twins-news/minnesota-twins-minor-leagues/draft-board-v30-420-r1383

 

And sure enough, here he is....

 

Things like this should be talked about more.

[gocgo]

 

I actually don't think it started til after... and Vargas was suspended for using a diuretic not a PED. 

 

But still, Cano mentors Sano... and I haven't heard Robby say anything about how the Twins are using Sano. But who is? Papi.

Diuretics are often used as masking agents for PEDs and to get flush them out of the system faster.  It may also be that he was trying to use a diuretic to simply lose weight quickly before a weigh in.

 

Papi should worry about Papi...kind of like Cano is just worried about Cano.

[tobi0040]

The best advice for Papi would be to see a therapist. Seriously, it has been 14 years and he has gone on to win multiple championships, make a ton of money and be about as well liked by a large city as you can find. Don't be that guy that is still complaining about his first marriage 15 years ago.

 

He also isn't the first guy that was overlooked by the entire league (Papi signed a minor league deal with Boston, started in the bench and then signed a 2 year deal for a total of 4 million).

 

I don't hear guys like Jose Bautista, Chris Davis, or even Sammy Sosa dwelling About how other teams screwed up.

[Otto von Ballpark]

He also isn't the first guy that was overlooked by the entire league (Papi signed a minor league deal with Boston, started in the bench and then signed a 2 year deal for a total of 4 million).

Not true. He signed a major league deal with Boston for $1.25 million. His next deal with Boston was for 1 year, $4.6 mil the following winter. He didn't get his first multiyear deal until partway through 2004, signing for 2/12.5 covering 2005-2006.

 

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/card/card.php?id=1499

 

Also, while his playing time didn't pick up until he heated up that summer, he was hardly a strict bench player at the outset, starting 4 of Boston's first 6 games that season, for example.

 

I find it odd that people keep trying to dismiss Ortiz's gripes by trotting out falsehoods about career. And you wonder why he might still feel disrespected...

Edited April 2, 2016 by spycake

[tobi0040]

So my memory about the first two deals was off. The word "bench" was also a little off, if you remove his games with 1 AB he played in 13 games in April, 14 in May, and 22 in June. Giambi was released after playing in 50 games and his season was described as "injury riddled", so one can assume that Ortiz played more than planned based on injuries initially.

 

I don't want to get caught up in the details. The fact is every team had a crack at him and he signed for very little and was not an everyday player. Given that and Terry Ryan jokes about how big of a miss this was, I think it is about time for Papi to bury the hatchet.