Game Thread: Twins @ Blue Jays, 5/8/19, 6:07 CT

[MVP Nick Punto]

Cruz with 10 men left on base, not something I can remember seeing in a box score.

Gotta get it out of his system! What better time than now?

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Oh I get it, and the process behind it. But when I guy has another chance for the cycle? So what. He's 25, and he gets to play baseball with a day off tomorrow. 25 year olds ain't what they used to be, I guess....... get that rest.

No, 25 year olds are in better shape today than they ever were... we're just smarter about how to manage the human body.

 

I'd rather see the team put themselves in the position to win more games in August than chase after the most pointless novelty stat in all of sports in early May.

[MVP Nick Punto]

No, 25 year olds are in better shape today than they ever were... we're just smarter about how to manage the human body.

 

I'd rather see the team put themselves in the position to win more games in August than chase after the most pointless novelty stat in all of sports in early May.

But don't novelties increase in value? Especially if you keep them in the original packaging?

[ashbury]

[wavedog]

Great Series - that was a lot of fun!

[Mill1634]

Twins Win!!!

 

Fantastic outing from Gibson, the bats are amazing once again, and the bullpen doesn't bat an eye either. The Twins did exactly what they needed to do against an inferior team. Let's do the same this weekend.

 

Have a good evening, and Thursday, y'all.

 

Go Twins. 

[Blake]

 

[h2oface]

 

No, 25 year olds are in better shape today than they ever were... we're just smarter about how to manage the human body.

 

I'd rather see the team put themselves in the position to win more games in August than chase after the most pointless novelty stat in all of sports in early May.

 

I am sure that 2 more innings in this game, in May, this one time, is gonna make a drastic difference in August. Saved him. Wonderful. There will be many days, with no days off the next day, to take time off. It is a 162 game season I was just informed, so there will be plenty of time to rest and not play. Days when you are 0-5 and not dialed in and need a rest.

[Blake]

Yawn.

 

Another win.

 

And another series sweep.

 

Will the torture never cease?

 

darn well better not!

[GCTF]

 

Somewhere near St. Cloud, some jackass sporting a mullet and a Megadeth t-shirt is telling everyone he knows that this is all solely because Joe Mauer is no longer on the team.

Something something Eric Munson.

[IndianaTwin]

 

Blue Jays, Orioles...The Twins really like hitting against birds

 

 

Anyone going to the games against the TIgerbirds? And I assume that since Angels fly, that's pretty much the same thing. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

I am sure that 2 more innings in this game, in May, this one time, is gonna make a drastic difference in August. Saved him. Wonderful. There will be many days, with no days off the next day, to take time off. It is a 162 game season I was just informed, so there will be plenty of time to rest and not play. Days when you are 0-5 and not dialed in and need a rest.

These things lie in the margins, not in any individual decision.

 

Maybe you rest all nine starters an extra 36 innings a season and nothing happens. Maybe you rest them all an extra 36 innings and save two IL stints.

 

And that's what this front office is implementing; a strategy to give players rest when and where they can to hopefully prevent an injury later in the season (or simply keep that player producing at a higher level).

 

In a sport where winning an extra 2% of your games is usually a big deal when the season completes, it fascinates me how little importance people give working within that 2% margin to your advantage as often as you can.

[ashbury]

Anyone going to the games against the TIgerbirds? And I assume that since Angels fly, that's pretty much the same thing. 

 

[Nine of twelve]

 

 the most pointless novelty stat in all of sports 

Yes. While hitting for the cycle is kind of a cool statistical anomaly it correlates very weakly with the player's team winning the game. Compare that with a no-hitter. No-hitters correlate very strongly with the player's team winning the game.

[ashbury]

Yes. While hitting for the cycle is kind of a cool statistical anomaly it correlates very weakly with the player's team winning the game.

And today's game shows why. If we'da been losing, he woulda stayed in. Correlation is not causation.

 

_{^{/ I jest ... probably}}

[MVP Nick Punto]

I know it's only May, but when was the last time the twins were in first all alone this far into a season?

[Jham]

Of all the new stats, my favorite is still the ole magic number. Can we get some magic number action up in here?

[Bark's Lounge]

Something seems quite magical about this team. 2006 seems like the last time I felt this way, but the game was quite different then... the Twins still had that stank to them. We have a semi new regime on our hands and the vision is panning out so far... no stank. We'll see how it goes. It's been damn fun to watch.

 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Anyone going to the games against the TIgerbirds? And I assume that since Angels fly, that's pretty much the same thing.

Perhaps you are referring to the Flying Tigers?

 

Not that i wish to compare Gardy with Chennault...

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Something seems quite magical about this team. 2006 seems like the last time I felt this way, but the game was quite different then... the Twins still had that stank to them. We have a semi new regime on our hands and the vision is panning out so far... no stank. We'll see how it goes. It's been damn fun to watch.

Yeah, i'm pretty happy so far, even if i am only half paying attention.

 

Good to hear from ya again!

[ashbury]

Of all the new stats, my favorite is still the ole magic number. Can we get some magic number action up in here?

Bookmark this: https://s2.smu.edu/~olinick/riot/american_league.html

 

Twins magic number 118 today.

[USAFChief]

 

This is a good example of how perception betrays reality.

 

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.fcgi?id=cruzne02&t=b&year=2019

 

Cruz has six one-hit games.

You and your "facts" and "research" and reliance on data. pfft.

[ashbury]

Cruz either gets multiple hits, or no hits. Maybe two games with one hit, and one of them was a pinch hit single at bat.

 

This is a good example of how perception betrays reality.

 

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.fcgi?id=cruzne02&t=b&year=2019

 

Cruz has six one-hit games.^**

Baseball has long been considered a statistician's delight. And yet, the traditional stats are really simple, either counting stats, or else simple means like batting average and ERA. One further step would be to compute variance for things, for instance to get a handle on consistency, and yet I don't know of any popular stats based on variance. (There are some difficulties in trying to construct one.) The following non-baseball graph from Wikipedia illustrates a way two players could have similar batting averages or ERA and yet deliver very different results to the team.

 

So, with that as preface, compare Nelson Cruz's hit-counts games in 2019 to Byron Buxton's (3 PA minimum), starting with the observation that their batting averages aren't very far apart:

 

 BA ... 0-hits ... 1-hit ... 2-hits ... 3-hits ... 4-hits

.277 ..... 13 ........ 5 ........ 6 ......... 3 ......... 1 ........ Cruz

.255 ...... 9 ........17 ........ 5 ......... 0 ......... 0 ........ Buxton

 

This spread of data looks kind of like the above graph, if you squint hard enough. I don't have the database chops^* to automate any kind of a good study, but doing this one by hand suggests there could be information to be learned.

 

What that information is worth, I don't know. If it was validated beyond small sample size, would you prefer a more "steady" player, or one more prone to offensive outbursts in between long snoozes? Probably the answer depends on a lot of additional factors.

 

^{* _{Nor table-formatting, apparently}}

^{** _{I left out pinch-hitting, since 0-1 or 1-1 makes the concept of "variance" a bit harder than I'm willing to tackle}}