Article: Ode To Byron Buxton

[bluechipper]

 

And he's playing less and less because he cannot hit.  He was off against Berrios and off again yesterday.  I understand the desire to see him, but it isn't necessarily best for Buxton to keep him up while his hit tool continues to border somewhere between terrible and well below average. 

I think you can afford to have one guy in the lineup who's not hitting when he is elite in the field.

[Loosey]

If you take the abysmal April out of the equation Buxton's line looks better.  But .236/.281/.364 looks alright with his defense.  He also has a 31% K rate during May-June (which is way down from April.  If he can be a .250 hitter and add a little bit more power and walks, I think that is all-starish with his defense.

[Bill Brown69]

Ozzie Smith only hit over .250 once in his first 5 seasons and didn't win a gold glove until his 3rd season. 

 

Patience.

[mickeymental]

can't help thinking of paul blair. centerfielder extraordinaire ended with a career .302 obp and 96 ops+ over 17 seasons. also won eight gold gloves and finished in top 16 or better mvp three times. also played in six world series (four winners).

[ashbury]

I don't agree with either of these statements.  He can certainly learn things about hitting in AAA, and what is really hard is trying to get him into good habits when he's pressing and letting MLB pitching exploit him.  His problem right now is his approach, and win now mode doesn't exactly lend itself to improving his approach.

It depends on whether

• he is pressing because he is having trouble with pitch recognition, or
• he is having trouble with pitch recognition because he is pressing.

Such a chicken-and-egg question is not something that can be guessed confidently at a distance, and is probably a bit difficult close-up too. But I'll still guess that it is the former, in which case a trip to AAA would be of limited value; he just won't see enough major-league stuff there to do him good.

[USAFChief]

Bottom line: he must hit better than he has, or he's not going to stay in anyone's lineup. There is no level of defense that makes up for a 50 OPS+.

 

Fortunately, he probably will. He was a good hitter throughout the minors.

[tobi0040]

His defense has been slightly better than his offense has been brutal.

 

On the one hand, he is technically adding value. If his bat can improve towards mediocre he would be a better player. But I hope the optimism about his bat being elite by all has been eliminated. This level of ineptitude for this long does not have a good track record of turning elite.

 

If he can hit .250 he will be in the league for 15 years and make a fair amount of money and have a good career. But most of the comps that existed look like a dream right now.

[ashbury]

If you take the abysmal April out of the equation Buxton's line looks better. 

Exactly. Every game counts, when you are discussing pennant races and end-of-season awards and so forth. But when forecasting, sometimes it's wisest to just give a guy (or a team) a mulligan for the first portion of a season.

 

There's a danger that that turns into cherry-picking, but there's a reverse danger of continuing to factor in bad results when a partial correction may already have occurred.

 

My interpretation of this year's stats is that we have a light-stick gold-glove in centerfield, not a sub-mendoza black-hole in the batting lineup. A fairly empty .240 BA in center doesn't lead a team to a World Series, but good teams live with that if they must, especially if there is still room for growth.

 

This mark of a good player sticks in my mind: "he can beat you, even on days he's not hitting". Byron can kind of do that.

[bluechipper]

 

His defense has been slightly better than his offense has been brutal.

On the one hand, he is technically adding value. If his bat can improve towards mediocre he would be a better player. But I hope the optimism about his bat being elite by all has been eliminated. This level of ineptitude for this long does not have a good track record of turning elite.

If he can hit .250 he will be in the league for 15 years and make a fair amount of money and have a good career. But most of the comps that existed look like a dream right now.

Aaron Hicks has a near 1.000 OPS, and he wasn't the prospect that Buxton was.

 

I'm half joking, but Buxton is still just 23 years old. There's still the potential he can become a very good hitter.

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

If you take the abysmal April out of the equation Buxton's line looks better.  But .236/.281/.364 looks alright with his defense.  He also has a 31% K rate during May-June (which is way down from April.  If he can be a .250 hitter and add a little bit more power and walks, I think that is all-starish with his defense.

 A .645 OPS and 31% K rate is nothing write home about. It's still below average.  I'll grant you that from April to May, he improved...  If he's improving from May to June, I'd tend to agree that you might be right in keeping him up, but it seems as though he's regressed a bit lately.  Maybe I'm wrong there, and I'd like to be. 

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

I think you can afford to have one guy in the lineup who's not hitting when he is elite in the field.

 

I understand that. It's a question about what is best for Buxton as well. 

[Nick Nelson]

 

And he's playing less and less because he cannot hit.  He was off against Berrios and off again yesterday.  I understand the desire to see him, but it isn't necessarily best for Buxton to keep him up while his hit tool continues to border somewhere between terrible and well below average. 

So you send him down to Triple-A, and he rakes again for several weeks, meanwhile the MLB team is worse-off without him. Then what? Bring him back up and hope it's different from the last handful of times they tried the same thing?
 

Buxton needs to stay up here, getting everyday reps against big-league pitching, working with James Rowson, and helping these pitchers. I don't even really see it as debatable. 

[Mike Sixel]

I don't think you can call him a star just yet....and he's not just a little behind Correa. He can't even see Carlos from how far behind he is. 

 

BTW, elite level players are USUALLY elite level players by 23 or 24. That's part of why they are elite, they are already among the best at a young age, and stay that way. We've seen very little evidence he can hit yet.

 

OTOH, his defense is quite impressive. Amazing even. 

Edited June 14, 2017 by Mike Sixel

[adorduan]

 

So you send him down to Triple-A, and he rakes again for several weeks, meanwhile the MLB team is worse-off without him. Then what? Bring him back up and hope it's different from the last handful of times they tried the same thing?
 

Buxton needs to stay up here, getting everyday reps against big-league pitching, working with James Rowson, and helping these pitchers. I don't even really see it as debatable. 

Sure, just don't call him a "star".  He isn't one, yet.  He may never be. It might all click tomorrow.  Who knows?  My crystal ball sucks...

[Twodogs]

Compare last year's starting OF of Arcia LF, Santana CF, and Sano in RF with Rosario LF, Buxton CF, and Kepler RF. It's no wonder Hughes did OK up to his DL listing. Gibson is like 4 - 4 right now, if he had pitched last year like he has this year he would have been 0 - 8.

[nytwinsfan]

Don't look now but Buxton's OPS is over .600 (.612 to be exact).

[Cast of Thousands]

Buxton's been averaging about .255 since the end of April.  At what point do we cut him a TINY bit of slack?

 

If you want a larger sample size, he's been averaging .235 since the end of August last season with 11 HR's.

 

A bad month of April and 2.5-3 decent-good months.  Right now, there's more than enough reason to have him in the lineup every day.

[Mike Sixel]

 

Buxton's been averaging about .255 since the end of April.  At what point do we cut him a TINY bit of slack?

 

If you want a larger sample size, he's been averaging .235 since the end of August last season with 11 HR's.

 

A bad month of April and 2.5-3 decent-good months.  Right now, there's more than enough reason to have him in the lineup every day.

 

Agreed, there is nowhere else for him to be than in the MN Twins' lineup.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

AAA has values beyond the stat lines, and I have a tough time believing Buxton is above replacement level right now. 

Overall for the season? Maybe not.

 

But since his disastrous start (52 PAs, .257 OPS), he has improved considerably (149 PAs, .743 OPS).

[NCtwinsfan]

Interesting read:

http://www.espn.com/mlb/beisbolexperience/story/_/id/19606693/how-twins-proving-value-defense

 

It's not just twins fans/writers. There is a lot of praise for Buxton in that article. A lot. The point I liked the most was that defense/fielding seems to be much less prone to "luck" and inconsistent fluctuation. The author says he is much more confident in Buxton maintaining his range than Aaron Judge maintaining his .405 BABIP. Buxton may be up and down offensively, but I feel pretty confident in saying his defense will almost always be excellent.

Also mentions the discrepancy between what teams will pay for runs prevented vs runs created is significant.