Eddie Rosario Demoted to Rochester

[jimbo92107]

Risk vs. reward.  Two outs, two on, down 3 runs, top of the 8th was the situation.  If he makes the third out (like say tripping and falling) the inning ends and for all intensive purposes so does the game--and for what?  He can't score on an out, but would score on a hit anyway--and his run isn't decisive!  His play is high school--not major league--and that's why he was benched.  He was demoted because his overall performance through the season, the stolen base was just one more indication of a "me first" attitude.

I disagree. Baseball is about applying pressure to your opponent, which sometimes requires poking them in unexpected ways. First, he didn't trip, did he? He was safe, wasn't he? It irritated Verlander, didn't it? 

 

You're mistaking creative, aggressive play for egotism. I'm not saying Rosario's game doesn't need work, but mainly his problem is strike zone discipline. Otherwise, I love Rosario's approach to baseball. He's a picador, and the opponent is the bull. He constantly looks for ways to harass the other other side, and we should encourage other players to do likewise. It's what makes baseball fun to watch. 

 

The trick to applying pressure creatively is for the whole team to be more like Rosario. I'm not saying they should act like little kids and be completely reckless. Rosario KNEW he was going to make it. My point is that other players should try to see what he sees. Nick Punto was like Rosario. It's a game of bunts, steals, fakes, bluffs, and taking advantage of the other team's inattention. 

 

All that said, Rosario does belong in AAA right now. He can't be swinging at balls a foot out of the zone. But that's his main problem, and it's fixable with enough coaching and yelling. Smaller strike zone, Eddie. He could be back up in a month. 

[Riverbrian]

 

It is funny that this offseason there was so much concern about where Sano, Buxton, Rosario, Kepler and Arcia were going to play since there are only 3 OF spots and the Twins had questionably filled the DH spot with Park. Now everyone is questioning why a legitimate starting OF'er wasn't brought in.

This board would have blown sky high if a decent OF'er would have been brought in and blocked Buxton or Rosario. This board hated Torii for filling that role last year.

 

Just for clarification... You mean everybody else on Twins Daily but not me... Right? 

[alarp33]

 

Yeah I wouldn't start Santana at this point in time if I didn't have to but I'd still hold out hope that he could turn things around.

 

Some of the same logic I use to declare that Dozier is no longer an everyday player at this moment but I'd like to keep him around in case he figures it out again. 

 

I guess we'll have to disagree on Santana, I don't see anything to suggest he's capable of becoming a useful player.  He was never particularly good throughout his minor league career, and that's when he played SS (where hitting isn't quite as important as OF)

 

I'm not the biggest Dozier fan, and could be put in the camp "trade him if he brings back useful pieces" to open up 2B for Polanco... but I'm not sure lumping him in with Santana is fair.  Even Dozier's poor 2016 is quite a bit better than Santana, and he has a track record of being an above avg second baseman.  

[Jham]

 

Hunter wasn't a decent OF'er last year, he was literally the 2nd worst hitting corner OF in all of baseball. That isn't decent... that is poor.

I think you're missing the point in your never-ending quest to kick more dirt on the grave of a retired Twins icon.  Hunter OPSed .756 through the first half hitting .257 with 14 HR.  His playing time diminished along with his production in the 2nd half as more youthful hitters took over.  That seems to be the definition of a successful place holder.  

To go back to the original point, Torii Hunter is irrelevant.  Whether the Twins should have brought in a "decent outfielder" is the question.  I'm fine with their gamble not to.  I think the point Kab was getting at is that you can't really have it both ways: kill the organization for going with a place holder, and kill them when their youth movement fails and they have to get a Grossman off the scrap heap.  The whole thing is turning into a dumpster fire, and I've seen a lot of misplaced frustration, and I can't say with certainty that Torii Hunter's leadership would have made this team better, but I do know the ensuing cluster was not his fault.  

[Otto von Ballpark]

If not Fowler this winter, then Rasmus last winter....

[LaBombo]

 

Who the hell is Robbie Grossman???? Why do we need to bring someone in from outside the organization?

 

The answers to your questions are:

 

1.   Exactly.

 

2.   Because the organization isn't very organized.

[DaveW]

 

I think you're missing the point in your never-ending quest to kick more dirt on the grave of a retired Twins icon.  Hunter OPSed .756 through the first half hitting .257 with 14 HR.  His playing time diminished along with his production in the 2nd half as more youthful hitters took over.  That seems to be the definition of a successful place holder.  

To go back to the original point, Torii Hunter is irrelevant.  Whether the Twins should have brought in a "decent outfielder" is the question.  I'm fine with their gamble not to.  I think the point Kab was getting at is that you can't really have it both ways: kill the organization for going with a place holder, and kill them when their youth movement fails and they have to get a Grossman off the scrap heap.  The whole thing is turning into a dumpster fire, and I've seen a lot of misplaced frustration, and I can't say with certainty that Torii Hunter's leadership would have made this team better, but I do know the ensuing cluster was not his fault.  

He ended the season with a .702 OPS, 567 PA and a 89 OPS+, while playing poorly in RF. You act like he suddenly didn't see the field in the second half of the season when that clearly isn't the case. He ended the season with a negative WAR (-0.8) which means that we would have been better offer with a replacement level player instead of him, if they could have gotten a 2-3 WAR player (which is what you should get if you are shelling out 10 million dollars for a player) than the Twins likely win a wild card spot. Torii Hunter was not the reason why the Twins played halfway decent last year.

 

 

I have nothing against Hunter, I think he was one of the best Twins players of all time, it was just a huge mistake to sign him up for starting RF prior to last season. The fact that we paid 10+ million and he ended up as the 2nd worst corner OF in baseball seems to prove that, no? Especially as many of us were calling for guys like Nelson Cruz. It's not his fault that Terry Ryan clearly overpaid for him, both in terms of a guaranteed starting spot and money.

[DaveW]

 

 

This board would have blown sky high if a decent OF'er would have been brought in and blocked Buxton or Rosario. This board hated Torii for filling that role last year.

Not true, several of us were calling for an additional good OF to be signed. Double so after Hicks was traded, most people suggested that Buxton may not be ready from day one anyways, so thus the "blocking" issue was never a real issue.

 

Additionally if you look at the regression candidate thread, the majority of people were predicting that Rosario would be the big regression candidate. Plus Sano never should have been in the OF to begin with....at any point...ever.

[LaBombo]

 

However... A side note... If I was Trevor Plouffe... forget Molitor, Ryan or any of us. If I was Trevor Plouffe... I'd be begging for the chance to play OF or any other position. Plouffe has been an average 3B for his entire career and at some point down the road he will be fighting for work. He will have a better chance finding a job later and prolonging his career if he increased his position options and therefore increasing the odds that he will match up with more teams possible needs. He isn't talented enough to type cast himself as a 3B only in my opinion. 

 

 

Absolutely.   A tiny bit of time at second base to reestablish his qualification to play there in an 'emergency' might not be the worst thing in the world,  either.

 

The front office has made it known over the years that it wants to be regarded as 'player-friendly' in such matters,  so there's already a general precedent there.

 

And while they're at it,  how about they hold their noses and take the best offer for Pluffy,  even if it doesn't meet their expectations?   He's probably got only a year or maybe two left as a starting-caliber 3b anyway,  and doesn't (or at least shouldn't) figure in the team's long term plans at third.

 

Why not give him a shot at playing some ball in October for a change,  after spending his entire major league career on a team that's averaged 90 losses a year?

[HitInAPinch]

 

Who the hell is Robbie Grossman???? Why do we need to bring someone in from outside the organization?

I'll speculate: 

 

Buxton continued to show he was a poor hitter at MLB level.  Needs much more work.

Rosario got sent down the day after Grossman was acquired, hitting being only part of the problem recently.

 

That's 2 reasons right there.  Mastroianni is already there and now Grossman makes 2.

 

Also:  Arcia and Sano are tanking.  Arcia is returning to his old self.  Sano may need a kick in the butt like Rosario.  He has improved some lately.

 

That could be 2 more reasons. 

 

Kepler was called up and got only 14 PA's, so I'll wave on that.

[Dr. Evil]

I figured it to be a good time to bring up one of our own journeymen outfielders for a few weeks and instead we gotta grab someone else's junk and leap frog our own guys. How does that bode for morale in our minor league system? This is the kind of stuff Ryan has no clue on.

[alarp33]

 

I'll speculate: 

 

Buxton continued to show he was a poor hitter at MLB level.  Needs much more work.

 

 

Also:  Arcia and Sano are tanking.  Arcia is returning to his old self.  Sano may need a kick in the butt like Rosario.  He has improved some lately.

 

 

 

Buxton hasn't been in MN in a month, so I'm not sure how that explains why Grossman is here. 

 

Miguel Sano has an .850 OPS over the past month. In what way does he compare to Rosario?

[Thrylos]

 

It took Gardy over a decade, and even if we as fans wanted him replaced, there really wasn't anything he did that would be considered fire-able.
 

 

2006 post-season.  A post-season in which the Twins were the favorites and had the Cy Young and the MVP winners.  Belly up. 

 

That is when he should had been fired.   But not.  They dragged his and Andy's tail out for 9 more seasons and fired Jerry and Stelly before them.

 

Nuts.

[Mr. Brooks]

2006 post-season. A post-season in which the Twins were the favorites and had the Cy Young and the MVP winners. Belly up.

 

That is when he should had been fired. But not. They dragged his and Andy's tail out for 9 more seasons and fired Jerry and Stelly before them.

 

Nuts.

In addition to the MVP and Cy Young, they also had that years batting champ (Mauer), a top 3 closer ( Nathan), and a gold glove CF'er in his prime (Hunter). And we still got swept by the mediocre A's.

Embarrassing. And the Twins defenders will say our lack of post season success is because we always ran into better teams with superior payrolls. Not true!

[Guest]

It is funny that this offseason there was so much concern about where Sano, Buxton, Rosario, Kepler and Arcia were going to play since there are only 3 OF spots and the Twins had questionably filled the DH spot with Park. Now everyone is questioning why a legitimate starting OF'er wasn't brought in.

This board would have blown sky high if a decent OF'er would have been brought in and blocked Buxton or Rosario. This board hated Torii for filling that role last year.

Very true. While expecting Sano to be rough in RF, Buxton to possibly struggle and Rosario to regress, no one anticipated TSF in the OF. It was not expected that Buxton would hit worse than Aaron Hicks, that Rosario would be so bad at the plate, or that Kepler would have to restart his season in late April.

[HitInAPinch]

 

Buxton hasn't been in MN in a month, so I'm not sure how that explains why Grossman is here. 

 

Miguel Sano has an .850 OPS over the past month. In what way does he compare to Rosario?

My comment was more towards the overall state of the outfield and

 

" Spikecurveball, on 19 May 2016 - 10:59 AM, said:

Who the hell is Robbie Grossman???? Why do we need to bring someone in from outside the organization?  "

 

So, we got Mastroianni replacing Buxton and Grossman replacing Rosario because 2 of this season's starting outfield have been demoted.  I don't believe any other MiLB OF is ready for the MLB right now.  That's just my opinion. 

 

According to Baseball Reference, over the past 28 days, Sano's OPS is .738, BA .225 and has struck out 36 times in 89 AB's.  I'm not a follower of BABIP, but according to Fan Graphs at .306, he's somewhere around league average.  I couldn't locate an actual scale.  

 

And I never compared Sano to Rosario.

[Hosken Bombo Disco]

Not that it matters anymore, but Danny Santana was having a good game tonight. He is turning into a decent center fielder. Then he committed a baserunning blunder at the end tonight that was a 100-fold worse (to use Molitor's words) than Rosario's stolen base Wednesday. I would have liked to see Rosario given the same vocal support Santana was given. It's a mystery how various players on this team are treated so differently irrespective of their abilities. At the plate I feel Santana relies too much on the bunt, and perhaps the league will catch on eventually. But he can fill in fine until Buxton is called back up.

[alarp33]

 

 

 

According to Baseball Reference, over the past 28 days, Sano's OPS is .738, BA .225 and has struck out 36 times in 89 AB's.  I'm not a follower of BABIP, but according to Fan Graphs at .306, he's somewhere around league average.  I couldn't locate an actual scale.  

 

And I never compared Sano to Rosario.

 

Miguel Sano Fangraphs --> Game Logs --> April 18 to May 18

 

AVG OBP SLG wOBA wRC+

252 .345 .495   .361     130

 

That is quite the "tanking" job... he needs to "Get the Rosario treatment"?

[alarp33]

 

Not that it matters anymore, but Danny Santana was having a good game tonight. He is turning into a decent center fielder. Then he committed a baserunning blunder at the end tonight that was a 100-fold worse (to use Molitor's words) than Rosario's stolen base Wednesday. I would have liked to see Rosario given the same vocal support Santana was given. It's a mystery how various players on this team are treated so differently irrespective of their abilities. At the plate I feel Santana relies too much on the bunt, and perhaps the league will catch on eventually. But he can fill in fine until Buxton is called back up.

 

His batting line since 2015 began.  .2241/.247/.301.  He has a worse OPS since 2015 than Buxton does in the Majors.  

 

There seems to be a case with him where perception does not meet reality.  And I would say it largely has to do with how the team treats him, like you point out .  He plays every day, hell, he led off or hit 2nd multiple times this year.  

[ShouldaCouldaWoulda]

 

His batting line since 2015 began.  .2241/.247/.301.  He has a worse OPS since 2015 than Buxton does in the Majors.  

 

There seems to be a case with him where perception does not meet reality.  And I would say it largely has to do with how the team treats him, like you point out .  He plays every day, hell, he led off or hit 2nd multiple times this year.  

Twins really seem to have a tough time developing athletic 'toolsy' guys like Santana, Rosario, and Buxton. I think they might just be allowing them to skate by with their superior athleticism in the minors and to hack at anything building no plate discipline. Sometimes their athleticism can carry them for a while in the majors in the way of high BAPIP, but it it not real.