Is This Unimpressive Byron Buxton the Permanent Version at the Plate?

[Mike Sixel]

32 minutes ago, bighat said:

Buxton wouldn't start on 3/4 of the MLB outfields today. It's a far cry from a few years ago where he was an elite option. His star shined bright, faded quickly, and is now fizzling out. 

I know injuries have been his main Achilles heel but he also has a record of streaks of horrific plate appearances even when perfectly healthy. Even without the injuries I think his career would be sidetracked - though perhaps not this severely.

His trade value is as low as it's ever been, no team wants him, if the Twins somehow managed to offload him we'd be paying a heavy price for someone to take on Bux and his contract. 

Great guy, elite fielder in his prime, and will always be one of the names that comes up frequently when old timers talk Twins baseball over while trolling for walleye in 20 years. 

He'll always be The Greatest that Never Was. 

He's 23rd in fWAR among CF, with not playing all year. He'd be around 18th had he played all year, so it's hyperbole to say he wouldn't start for most teams. That said, your points are valid, and he could degress from here even more. It's sad, really. So much promise and skill.

OTOH, he might just start hitting again, and he'd be around the 10th best CF then.......

[PDX Twin]

He has turned himself into a right-handed Joey Gallo. I've seen (at least) enough of this version of him.

[Eris]

5 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Buxton pulling the ball is a good thing right now. It means he's ahead of the pitch, where he needs to adjust his timing to catch up on the fastball, and I expect he'll get there.

I don’t think it is that simple, Buxton could be pulling the ball because he is anticipating (i.e., guessing) fastball and starts his swing earlier thereby making him very susceptible to sliders and other off speed pitches.

[Eris]

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/byron-buxton/14161/heat-maps?position=OF&ss=2024-03-28&se=2024-06-05&type=0&hand=all&count=a,2&blur=1&grid=10&view=bat&pitch=&season=all&data=
 

If I have done this correctly this should display Buxton’s 2 strike heat map. But I don’t know how to fully interpret the heat map other than to indicate that he is being pitched down and away. I couldn’t find a legend and don’t understand the meaning behind the different shades of red and blue. 

[jkcarew]

22 hours ago, bean5302 said:

I think Buxton will finish up the year at a wRC+ of around 120,

That would be well over his career average…he gives no indication of this.

Won’t come close to that without a sustained hot period (with HR’s in bunches)…the likes of which we haven’t seen from him for a long time.

[jkcarew]

8 hours ago, DJL44 said:

I like the unimpressive version of Buxton more than the unavailable version of Buxton. He's still performing about league average at the plate with above average defense which means he's worth every penny of his modest $15M salary.

Sitting at wRC+ of 83.

Not really that close to average.

[Craig Arko]

I don’t know. Pretty sure nobody else here does either. 

[RpR]

He is still chasing crap pitches, although, that still seems to be a Twins trait.

[USAFChief]

22 hours ago, DJL44 said:

 He's still performing about league average at the plate with above average defense. which means he's worth every penny of his modest $15M salary.

No. No it doesn't. 

It's not real difficult to find good CF defense.

He's a problem, and it appears to be getting worse.

For the record, his "modest" $15m salary is more than 10% of the budget.

[Cody Pirkl]

21 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Fangraphs has Byron Buxton at #45 of 315 batters with 100+ PA with a 47.9% pull rate with some hacks like Jose Altuve, Rhys Hoskins, Trea Turner, and Christian Yelich well above Buxton. The biggest problem Buxton's had this year is the fastball, and catching up to the fastball in specific. There's an article about it from a few weeks ago around here somewhere... where is it.... here, I found it.

Buxton pulling the ball is a good thing right now. It means he's ahead of the pitch, where he needs to adjust his timing to catch up on the fastball, and I expect he'll get there.

In general, pulling the ball can be a good thing, especially in the air. Selling out to try to do only that, while also having extremely poor plate discipline is not a good thing. Yes, Buxton has other issues like not catching up to fastballs this season, but his approach is very bad.

Why would anyone give him something to pull over the fence when he's swinging whether the pitch is in the zone or not? His approach also relies on his hands remaining lightning quick to turn on pitches, which by the way, may already be waning on him at age 30 as evidenced by his inability to hit fastballs.

Whether it was for injury reasons or to chase homers, he's made himself a one trick pony offensively in a way that's almost guaranteed to decline with age. It's very sad to see.

[ewen21]

22 hours ago, bighat said:

Buxton wouldn't start on 3/4 of the MLB outfields today. It's a far cry from a few years ago where he was an elite option. His star shined bright, faded quickly, and is now fizzling out. 

I know injuries have been his main Achilles heel but he also has a record of streaks of horrific plate appearances even when perfectly healthy. Even without the injuries I think his career would be sidetracked - though perhaps not this severely.

His trade value is as low as it's ever been, no team wants him, if the Twins somehow managed to offload him we'd be paying a heavy price for someone to take on Bux and his contract. 

Great guy, elite fielder in his prime, and will always be one of the names that comes up frequently when old timers talk Twins baseball over while trolling for walleye in 20 years. 

He'll always be The Greatest that Never Was. 

I agree with everything except the great guy part.  

[bighat]

2 hours ago, ewen21 said:

I agree with everything except the great guy part.  

Really? I haven't heard anything negative ever said about his character or clubhouse personality. Have you experienced or heard differently? 

[ewen21]

17 hours ago, bighat said:

Really? I haven't heard anything negative ever said about his character or clubhouse personality. Have you experienced or heard differently? 

There are three things I can site.  These are MY reasons and you may not feel they are valid reasons and that is your right. Everyone would have to remember these three things,, but I will go through it anyway.....

The first time I saw Buxton act out was when he was not called up in September of 2018.  He stormed off, left Rochester and didn't take calls for a while.  When he came Gillette Children's Hospital in December he still harped on it and was saying "I ain't sugarcoating nothing".  Oh really?  He had a horrible 2018 and didn't do well in Rochester until just before callups when he had a couple of multiple hit games.  He'd barely played all year and he hit terribly when he did.  THere was a laundry list of ailments he went though and it made no sense to have him play meaningless games in September after a year like that.   Who is he to storm off from his teammates in Rochester, go radio silent for a few months and then come back to criticize his bosses at an event at a children's hospital?  Many here thought he was mistreated and screwed over, so I am guessing you felt that way as well.  Whether he was or wasn't his crybaby routine didn't go over well with me.  Not after that horrendous 2018 season which occurred right after I thought he figured it out.  He clearly had not.

Buxton says lack of September call-up 'didn't go over well'; Twins say he's starter in center field (startribune.com)

 

The we have the batting practice banter from him.  Buxton was the one who said:

Quote

"I haven't taken batting practice on the field in probably two years,"

Why make such a proclamation? I do not care that he hits in the cage indoors.  Whatever he is doing it isn't working.  He cannot seem to settle on any kind of sound and repeatable mechanics.   His career lifetime OBP is .298 and he isn't a good hitter major league hitter by any standard and he has to say that?  He has horrible hitting mechanics and has for his whole career.  

Twins' Byron Buxton hasn't taken outdoor batting practice 'in probably two years' (startribune.com)

From this article above:

Quote

In a sense, Buxton is a self-made hitter, Baldelli agreed. Early in his professional career, and especially during slumps and stretches of strikeouts, he soaked up advice from many sources. Too many, he finally decided, until vowing four years ago to "go back to what got me here and just keep it simple."

He eventually developed a method that works for him, Buxton said, and "my routine stays the same now. I trust it." Hitting coaches Edgar Varela and Rudy Hernandez watch to "let me know if they see something wrong," he said, "but you get to the point where you've got to start figuring out things for yourself, things to help you feel good and get comfortable in the box."

He seems to have autonomy to do what he wants.  I do not like that for any player who isn't even a lifetime .240

 

Finally, there was that absurd Twitter exchange he had with fans last year after someone made a joke about him being careful to not get injured at the uniform reveal last winter.  He had "rabbit ears" on social media with fans calling them "clowns".   THAT is a clown move by a professional athlete.   I am not for social media. This is the extent of my "social media" and I think it is a clown move for a pro athlete to engage with and get mad at internet trolls.  Whether the trolls are clowns or not, a pro athlete has to be smarter than that.  I am guessing you probably do not feel that way, but I do.

 

I have a pretty high profile public job and I do not engage my critics online like he did because it is stupid to me.  It achieves nothing and it shows that he might not have the temperament to hold up to the rigors are life in the majors.

 

So, these are three examples where i think work ethic, mindset and commitment to the craft are questionable.

[Larry Janisewski]

On 6/5/2024 at 9:39 PM, tony&rodney said:

I said several times in the offseason that Buxton needs to rework his swing. He is too much all or nothing and I would never fear pitching to a guy with that severe cut. Buck has a long term contract and the Twins need to insist that Byron move towards a different approach or a .700 OPS is his ceiling.

Does anyone believe that Buck is a threat in the batter's box at this time?

Buxton was much more fun to watch while in the minors at Chattanooga when he hit the ball allover the field and used his speed. Since he has pretty much become an all or nothing hitter (similar to what Sano became) he is not using his natural talents. His strikeout % should be about 1/2 of what it is.

[SoDakTwinsFan]

This has always been Buxton at the plate.  He has always been unimpressive.  Twins fans all thought he would figure it out.  All you had to do was looks at his career stats and realize he is just a bad MLB hitter.  

But some of you thought we HAD to sign him.  At the time we resigned him he had been a 1x all star with a career BA around .230 and had no track record of staying healthy.  Why did we NEED to sign the guy?

[ewen21]

21 hours ago, SoDakTwinsFan said:

This has always been Buxton at the plate.  He has always been unimpressive.  Twins fans all thought he would figure it out.  All you had to do was looks at his career stats and realize he is just a bad MLB hitter.  

But some of you thought we HAD to sign him.  At the time we resigned him he had been a 1x all star with a career BA around .230 and had no track record of staying healthy.  Why did we NEED to sign the guy?

This isn’t hindsight.  I felt the same way ESPECIALLY after his tantrum at the end of 2018 when he wasn’t a September call up.

 

He hit .156 and had a variety of ailments that kept him out of the lineup.  In Rochester he was hitting around .230/.240 until he had a couple of multi hit games just before September call ups.  I think his reaction was unacceptable and at the point we should have known better than to give him that incentive loaded contract.