One Nerdy Stat For Each Twins Diamond Award Winner

[Lou Hennessy]

Eight current Twins were named winners of the annual awards, including six for their performances on the field. While there were a few surprises, each of these Twins had something about their season that provided interesting context to their success.

Image courtesy of © Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

Sure, there’s plenty more to the game of baseball than the firehose of in-depth information and statistics that seems to sandblast us each season. But each of the Twins who were recently named winners of the annual Diamond Awards has some nerdy tidbit that colors in between the lines, giving a fuller picture of what made them unique this season. Inside Edge Advance Scouting provided us with some fascinating (and admittedly pretty nerdy) notes that can help contextualize the six Twins whose performance on the field led to these awards. 

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Most Valuable Player - Willi Castro
“Willi Castro netted five extra hits against the shift (seven hits caused by the shift, two hits that were robbed due to the shift) in the 2024 season.” 

Castro was not the betting favorite to be named the MVP of this year’s club. Sure, the versatile 27-year-old had by far his finest season, and certainly warranted a selection to the All-Star Game at the time. But his dismal second half was a significant factor in the team’s freefall, and he ended the season with a good-not-great .247/.331/.385 slash line. 

Regardless, his nerdy stat regarding the shift, paired with a dramatic dip in his second-half BABIP (batting average of balls in play), help to paint a picture: Castro may have had some good luck in the first half of the season and some bad luck in the second half. His true offensive profile likely lands somewhere in between.

Now, is it possible that Castro’s approach led to more hits against the shift? Sure. But his plus-five hits ranked second in all of baseball, and I would find it hard to believe that he had the second-best ability to snipe these kinds of hits intentionally, whatever his speed and his proclivity for chaos would imply.

Pitcher of the Year - Griffin Jax
“Griffin Jax struck out 27 batters on three pitches in the 2024 season.”

While Castro’s selection as MVP raised a few eyebrows, the Pitcher of the Year award was a pretty easy choice. Whether you follow the on-paper stats or trust the eye test more, Jax excelled. He was by far the most dominant arm at the Twins’ disposal for the entire year, and he shot himself into the “Best Relievers in the American League” conversation with a fantastic campaign that saw him pitch to the tune of a 2.03 ERA across 71 innings pitched. 

His 27 three-pitch punchouts led baseball, and is a perfect distillation of his emergence into relief ace status. HIs elite sweeper, paired with his excellent changeup and some upper-90s velocity on his fastballs, truly made him a nightmare to face. 

Outstanding Rookie - Simeon Woods Richardson
“Opponents had a Hard-Hit Rate of just 21% against Simeon Woods Richardson on low breaking pitches.”

Woods Richardson was another reasonable selection, as the rookie cemented the middle of the Twins’ rotation for much of the 2024 season. He finished the year with a solid 4.17 ERA across 28 starts, with a considerably more encouraging campaign than his final line might suggest. He simply ran out of gas by the time the calendar flipped to September, where he had a 6.48 ERA in five exhausted starts.

Nevertheless, his 2024 season was a huge win for the club’s rotation outlook going forward, and his nerdy stat makes it easy to see which part of his arsenal will keep him in the big leagues. The righty had a strong penchant for avoiding hard contact on his breaking pitches--11th-best in baseball, to be exact. His slider and curveball were his two swing-and-miss offerings (both solidly in the 22-24% range for whiffs per swing), and when things were going right, he was able to get his opponents to chase them low and out of the zone. Look for that strategy to be his calling card going forward, hopefully with a deeper gas tank in 2025. 

Most Improved - Cole Sands
“Cole Sands allowed just a .429 OPS when behind in the count in the 2024 season.”

One of the biggest surprises of the 2024 season is one of the least surprising winners of their Diamond Award. Sands was viewed as one of the last calls coming out of spring training, but he truly excelled for the majority of the year, often finding himself to be one of the premier set-up options for manager Rocco Baldelli. He finished the season with a fantastic 3.28 ERA across 71 ⅓ innings pitched, with a 29% strikeout ratee, which was up nearly eight points from the year prior.

The nerdy stat shows that part of Sands’s success came from the fact that he was able to remain composed, even in instances where the hitter usually has had the edge. League-average OPS when the opponent is ahead in the count is a whopping 1.032. Sands’s figure in those circumstances was less than half that, and it led all of baseball by a fairly wide margin. (The closest was Daniel Lynch of the Kansas City Royals, at .598.) 

Defensive Player of the Year
“Carlos Santana made 16 non-routine plays out of 24 chances (67%) in the 2024 season.”

Even at 38 years old, Santana was still able to bring it on the field, playing dazzling defense in 150 of the club’s games. While he was seen as somewhat of a “scratch-and-dent aisle” signing last offseason, the first baseman was an integral part of the team’s offense and one of the centerpieces of their defense. His ability to make all the easy plays--mixed with his ever-present propensity for making the standout, highlight-reel ones--left many in Twins Territory with the notion that he is the best-fielding first baseman in the game. 

The fact that Santana was able to succeed in nearly two-thirds of his opportunities to make plays that weren’t deemed “certain” or “likely” to be made shows just how much of the team’s water he carried. Not only did he have the most made plays under that umbrella, but those plays saved some of his teammates from errors, and eliminated potential scoring chances for the opposition. Not only is this award deserved for the veteran, but Santana should be seen as the frontrunner for the Gold Glove award. 

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What do you think? Do you agree with the BBWAA writers who selected these winners? What changes would you make? Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and as always, keep it sweet.

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[nclahammer]

Mind blowing stats TD, especially Jax and the 27 three pitch k's.  Wowzers!

[JD-TWINS]

Not sure I understand Castro being MVP? Other TD (different writer apparently) had Castro as 7th in MVP listing.

Anyway, Jax & Sands & Santana all have nerdy stats that actually showed up in numerous wins in ‘24. Castro definitely was a major contributor this season but his nerdy stat seems like a serious reach, IMO.

[LambchoP]

I'm hoping for a bounce back season for Duran, but if he struggles, Jax would be an all-star closer. Just need to surround him with other good pitchers to get us to the ninth inning in the lead. Of course that means we would have to score runs too....

[DJL44]

40 minutes ago, JD-TWINS said:

Not sure I understand Castro being MVP? Other TD (different writer apparently) had Castro as 7th in MVP listing.

The Diamond Awards are voted on by the Twin Cities chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America, not people from TwinsDaily.

[tarheeltwinsfan]

Should Santana be considered for the Platinum Glove Award? He was outstanding. 

[bean5302]

Castro played a ton of positions at Baldelli's request, and that's worth something in terms of the Twins strategy. Since Willi ended up the season pretty much exactly the same as last season wRC+ 108-109, I think he's done great at cementing himself as a solid MLB bat at this point. Great news for him as he approaches free agency.

Jax and Sands had great years in general. I know a few people want Jax to be given a shot at the rotation, but I'm not sure being absolutely dominant helps or hurts his case. It'll be interesting to see how those guys move forward.

Santana's "unlikely plays" illustrate why DRS isn't stable as a metric. Overall, he contributed to less real outs than his peers at 1B, but the bonus multipliers can warp results. I didn't like the way Santana played 1B this year watching the games. 

I like that info about Woods-Richardson. TBH, I hadn't really dived into his results based on his pitches and locations much. Hopefully, the coaches can work with him again this spring to help him optimize his limited stuff. Also, here's hoping the trainers can get him into better shape. Sim hitting a wall and running out of gas as in August at 112 innings as a 23 year old with 7 years of professional experience is a huge red flag about his potential future in the rotation to me.

[S Bart]

The Twins have nobody on their staff that have the ability to play 1st like Santana. They probably will put somebody like Miranda or Julian (Big Mistake in my view) in that role due to not renewing Santana...

[Parfigliano]

Utility player Willi Castro as MVP says nothing good about the Twins.

[jmlease1]

22 hours ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

Should Santana be considered for the Platinum Glove Award? He was outstanding. 

No. As good as Santana was at 1B, you just can't accumulate the kind of value and make the number of defensive plays there that you can at SS or CF or C. And it's not like there wasn't elite play at those positions in 2024. Santana deserves the AL Gold Glove at 1B (we'll see if he gets it, or if it goes to someone more famous, though)