Boom or Bust: Exploring Emmanuel Rodriguez’s Wide-Ranging MLB Potential

[Matthew Lenz]

The young Dominican outfielder is a consensus top-100 prospect in all of baseball, and a top-3 prospect for the Minnesota Twins. Despite this, he's a bit of a polarizing player; you’ll find drastically different opinions on the (soon-to-be) 22-year-old. What does his ceiling look like? How about his floor? Let's dive in.

Image courtesy of Rob Thompson / St. Paul Saints

In his first four professional seasons, Emmanuel Rodriguez has performed well, with elite plate discipline, an inevitably strong OBP, and an average quality of contact that can produce decent power and a passable batting average. Where scouts and prospect rankers seem to differ the most is how his plate approach will translate as he moves up and eventually reaches the big leagues.

His astonishingly low swing rate is a double-edged sword: his chase rate is low, but the lack of aggression can get him behind in counts. He's been limited by an extremely high swing-and-miss rate and a strikeout rate that flirts with 30%. If he can stay healthy, which is turning into a bit of a concern, he's a guy whose ceiling could be around 30 home runs with an OBP approaching .400. Think rookie Eddy Julien with a little more pop and a lot more defense. I chuckled while listening to episode 107 of the Future Projection podcast by Baseball America, wherein they suggested that a negative correlation exists between fans of Luis Arraez and Rodriguez, given their very different profiles.

Staying on the theme of player comps, let's expand our player pool beyond the Twins organization. Which players compare to the wide range of outcomes that are possible for Rodriguez?

Out Of This Universe Comp - Juan Soto
What's to say that, if the stars align and fortune smiles down on the Twins organization, Rodriguez can't become Juan Soto? Okay, sure, there's a lot that says he won't, but I'm talkin’ 99th-percentile outcome here. All he needs to do is cut his strikeout rate in half, which in turn leads to a boost in batting average, and voilà—we have our very own Soto. (We'll all try hard not to think about the fact that Soto had 328 hits, 228 walks, and a World Series ring in the majors by Rodriguez's current age.)

Ceiling Comp - Kyle Schwarber
A much more reasonable “ceiling” comp is Kyle Schwarber, who profiles very similarly to Rodriguez, with a very good walk rate but a very high strikeout rate. Schwarber has more power but plays considerably worse defense (hence primarily DHing in 2024), but Twins fans would be extremely happy if Rodriguez turned into a consistent 35+ homer hitter with a .340+ OBP. Schwarber makes a nice fit, too, because his extreme tendency toward strikeouts has limited his upside at times, which we know is a risk with Rodriguez.

Median Comp - Ian Happ
Happ is Schwarber with less power, but better defense. While I think Rodriguez will strike out more and hit for more power than the current, increasingly balanced version of Happ. I think he presents a really good ballpark for Rodriguez’s 50th-percentile outcome. When Happ first came up, he was more extreme in his offensive profile, but his game has always been driven at least partially by abundant athleticism. Rodriguez has that, too.

Floor Comp - Joey Gallo
While Gallo has had an eight-year career (and counting), it would be pretty disappointing if Rodriguez turned into a guy who hit below the Mendoza line with a strikeout rate north of 35%. Sure, Gallo has three seasons of 38 or more home runs, but he also has five with 21 or fewer.

We may very well see Rodriguez debut in 2025 at just 22 years old. Given his age (and keeping in mind development is rarely linear), I might expect more Gallo than Schwarber in the early parts of his career. That said, I don't think a Kyle Schwarber-esque player is out of the question down the road if the stars align on his development.

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What are your thoughts on these player comps? Leave your own in the comments!

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[NYCTK]

Comps bWAR -

Schwarber: 15.4

Happ: 17.7

Gallo: 15.4

Only to say, Twins fans gotta get over their hatred of Gallo. He had a pretty good career. Just not with the Twins. A career like Gallo should be very welcome for a second tier prospect.

With a player that looks like he will similarly strike out in 1/3 of his plate appearances (at least initially) that really limits his ceiling. But like you showed with Happ, there's always a chance he improves upon that specific skill in time. 

 

[ashbury]

It's the walks.  That's what's polarizing for me.  I look for comps to other players, and really can't find any. 

Judge and Soto get lots of walks now, but not like ERod.  MLB average BB% was 8.2 this past season. Judge's rate was 18.9 and Soto's was 18.1, the two best in the majors.  They drew nowhere near these rates when they were in the minors - it developed as pitchers gained respect, presumably.

Our guy drew walks 25.1% of the time at AA this past year.  It was even higher a couple of years ago at single-A, a little lower the next year at high-A. 

25% is just not sustainable, unless he's capable of being a completely new kind of player.  Maybe he is, but it seems like an unwise bet.

So he'll probably always walk a lot, but what becomes of the portion of walks that seem destined to vanish into thin air?  Do they

• turn into called third strikes, when he faces pitchers who can put the ball where they want?
• turn into swinging third strikes, as he finds himself in unaccustomed counts due to better pitching?
• turn into weak contact that harms his batting average?
• turn into the current mix of results he currently has?

I am not confident at all about that last one.

The closest comp I found, a year ago when I was delving into the question, was actually Eduoard Julien.  Not just within the Twins' farm system, but anywhere.  Julien himself is still an open question, after one successful year in the majors - and then one year that was, um, not successful, in ways that his approach to the plate made maddening.

And yet, ERod has already defied my expectations from a couple of years ago when his extreme walk rate became a topic of discussion.  So I really don't know what to expect.  We'll just have to wait and find out.

No way would I trade him.  I'm a prospect hugger to begin with, but he's above and beyond in that regard.  There's a 10% chance he turns into something really special at the plate.

There's also a 10% chance his approach doesn't translate to the majors at all.  Unlike with most minor league prospects, I'm skeptical about my usual minors-to-majors translations of his stats.

IOW, polarizing.

[DJL44]

More comps - Michael Conforto, Cory Snyder, Colby Rasmus, Max Kepler

[High heat]

If he can hit like Schwarber and play defense like Kepler you have a really good player!

Even Joey Gallo in his Texas days was a good to great player.

 

My fear is he remind me a lot of a guy Travis Snider out of the Toronto/Pirates organization.  Touted as a stretch CF with a big arm good power and plate discipline in the minors.  
 

Didnt make enough good contact in the majors and power didn’t translate.  Bulked up as he got older to add power and lost defensive range and didn’t increase consistent power.

[Tom Froemming]

Adam Dunn with more athleticism.

[jmlease1]

21 minutes ago, Tom Froemming said:

Adam Dunn with more athleticism.

it'd be a LOT more athleticism? Dunn was a notably terrible defensively player basically everywhere; dude had a terrific season at the plate in 2009 (144 OPS+? yes, please!) and gave it all back in the field and then some. would have done less damage if he's just been a DH his whole career. Emma is a much better OF. But I could live with Dunn's offensive production and quality defense.

He's a fascinating case. Wonder if the electronic strike zone will make a difference for a player like him, with tremendous discipline and a very strong understanding of the zone. You have to wonder if the times Ed Julien got rung up on pitches that were not strikes messed him up the most...

[gman]

What's going to be the hardest adjustment for Erod is adjusting to the umpire's inability to consistently call balls and strikes correctly. The umps may be the best in the world, but I don't think they can accurately call faster pitches and sharper breaking balls. If and when the majors switches to robo callers then Erod and Julian will be able to maximize their talent.

[DJL44]

2 minutes ago, gman said:

What's going to be the hardest adjustment for Erod is adjusting to the umpire's inability to consistently call balls and strikes correctly. The umps may be the best in the world, but I don't think they can accurately call faster pitches and sharper breaking balls. If and when the majors switches to robo callers then Erod and Julian will be able to maximize their talent.

Umpires call 97% of pitches correctly. 

Believe it or Not, Umpires Are More Accurate Than Ever | Pitcher List

Strike Three?! Let’s Check in on Umpire Accuracy | FanGraphs Baseball

[NYCTK]

9 minutes ago, gman said:

What's going to be the hardest adjustment for Erod is adjusting to the umpire's inability to consistently call balls and strikes correctly. The umps may be the best in the world, but I don't think they can accurately call faster pitches and sharper breaking balls. If and when the majors switches to robo callers then Erod and Julian will be able to maximize their talent.

He struck out 12 times in 30 plate appearances with the robo ump in AAA. 

 

[gman]

8 minutes ago, NYCTK said:

He struck out 12 times in 30 plate appearances with the robo ump in AAA. 

 

SSS

[gman]

13 minutes ago, DJL44 said:

Umpires call 97% of pitches correctly. 

Believe it or Not, Umpires Are More Accurate Than Ever | Pitcher List

Strike Three?! Let’s Check in on Umpire Accuracy | FanGraphs Baseball

How many of his at bats did you review yourself? Where the strike zone is lined up? Sometimes a poor call early in an at bat costs a player an at bat. Not just the third strike.

[tony&rodney]

Emmanuel is going to strike out, that is a given. He also has a significant boom or bust profile. Because of the potential boom the Twins need to let him play. I'm not seeing or thinking there is any reason for EmRod to marinate in AAA while people decide if he is going to make it or not. The defense is there. He has a really good glove and an ability to go get the ball. The bat is what the Twins want and he is ready right now. For me, he is a use or trade player. If the front office does not believe in Rodriguez then the trade value should return a strong player. The injury fear and the concerns about passivity at the plate can only be assuaged by playing time. It is now or never for Emmanuel.

[NYCTK]

1 hour ago, Tom Froemming said:

Adam Dunn with more athleticism.

Adam Dunn was shockingly "only" ~38% TTO in the minors. 

Judge ~ 41%

Happ ~40%

Schwarber ~ 41%

Wallner ~ 47% 

Julien ~ 50% 

Emmanuel is sitting right with Joey Gallo at 56%

So, we can see him become successful, but...I'd say Gallo is the median good outcome. The chance of him being a spectacular bust seems very high. 

 

[Rod Carews Birthday]

52 minutes ago, DJL44 said:

Umpires call 97% of pitches correctly. 

Believe it or Not, Umpires Are More Accurate Than Ever | Pitcher List

Strike Three?! Let’s Check in on Umpire Accuracy | FanGraphs Baseball

While that sounds like an excellent record, it’s actually not.  Generously, more than 50% of balls and strikes are easy calls, so that means that that success rate drops down to less than 94% for balls that are actually borderline.  Seems less impressive now doesn’t it?  

Let me put this another way.  In my real life, I am a musician (a conductor actually — insert joke here).  If you go hear the Minnesota Orchestra, or where I live, the Chicago Symphony, how many mistakes do you think those musicians make?  On a note by note basis, it’s way less than 1% and probably less than 1/10 of 1%.  They should be able to do that, because those players are absolutely at the top of their game.  They’re major leaguers, if you will.  To me, that means major league umpires should be able to do that as well.  

Now let me scare you.  A number of years ago, a company published a piece of music for high school band with mistakes written intentionally into the music just to prove a point about music education and the accuracy it involves compared to other subjects, like math.  The number of mistakes were about 5% and when the band played the music it was awful — unrecognizable and unlistenable.  I can’t easily draw the line from high school musician to professional umpire, but it does make you think a little.  

Back to Mr. Rodriguez. . . I agree with @ashbury that this is a terribly difficult one to predict because of the crazy amount of walks in his game.  I too doubt that the (soon to be) lost walks will just translate into equal production, but I would guess that a certain amount of it will.  My “realistic” pie in the sky comp for ERod is Curtis Granderson — a guy who hit a lot of home runs, struck out and walked a lot, but was athletic enough to also hit a lot of doubles and triples as well as steal a few bases.  At a career of over 40 WAR it puts him in the Hall of Very Good and I would be beyond thrilled with that outcome.  My floor is not a very happy one, because it hasn’t been identified yet.  It’s probably Eduard Julien.  Right now he’s teetering between figuring it out and becoming a successful major leaguer and not figuring it out and becoming a bust.  When we know Julien’s floor, then we will probably know Rodriguez’s floor as well.  Argh.

 

[NYCTK]

7 minutes ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

While that sounds like an excellent record, it’s actually not.  Generously, more than 50% of balls and strikes are easy calls, so that means that that success rate drops down to less than 94% for balls that are actually borderline.  Seems less impressive now doesn’t it?  

 

Not really, that's still really impressive. Watching and tracking pitches with that movement and velocity is difficult and the introduction of the digital tools, the umpires are getting better each and every year (though this is potentially due to the old guard retiring out of the league). 

I actually hate the strike zone displayed on the television because it's not always accurate and does nothing but get fans in a tizzy. 

I'm ambivalent about introducing the strike/ball challenge system. Seems to be pretty well implemented in AAA but I've never actually watched it in context of an actual game. 

[Jocko87]

30 minutes ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

While that sounds like an excellent record, it’s actually not.  Generously, more than 50% of balls and strikes are easy calls, so that means that that success rate drops down to less than 94% for balls that are actually borderline.  Seems less impressive now doesn’t it?  

Let me put this another way.  In my real life, I am a musician (a conductor actually — insert joke here).  If you go hear the Minnesota Orchestra, or where I live, the Chicago Symphony, how many mistakes do you think those musicians make?  On a note by note basis, it’s way less than 1% and probably less than 1/10 of 1%.  They should be able to do that, because those players are absolutely at the top of their game.  They’re major leaguers, if you will.  To me, that means major league umpires should be able to do that as well.  

Now let me scare you.  A number of years ago, a company published a piece of music for high school band with mistakes written intentionally into the music just to prove a point about music education and the accuracy it involves compared to other subjects, like math.  The number of mistakes were about 5% and when the band played the music it was awful — unrecognizable and unlistenable.  I can’t easily draw the line from high school musician to professional umpire, but it does make you think a little.  

Back to Mr. Rodriguez. . . I agree with @ashbury that this is a terribly difficult one to predict because of the crazy amount of walks in his game.  I too doubt that the (soon to be) lost walks will just translate into equal production, but I would guess that a certain amount of it will.  My “realistic” pie in the sky comp for ERod is Curtis Granderson — a guy who hit a lot of home runs, struck out and walked a lot, but was athletic enough to also hit a lot of doubles and triples as well as steal a few bases.  At a career of over 40 WAR it puts him in the Hall of Very Good and I would be beyond thrilled with that outcome.  My floor is not a very happy one, because it hasn’t been identified yet.  It’s probably Eduard Julien.  Right now he’s teetering between figuring it out and becoming a successful major leaguer and not figuring it out and becoming a bust.  When we know Julien’s floor, then we will probably know Rodriguez’s floor as well.  Argh.

 

Well now, you’re speaking my language.  As an umpire raised by musicians I am uniquely qualified to thread this needle.  

Using your orchestra analogy, how many of the musicians are asked to play every note? None.  How many are asked to play the most complicated notes? A select few.  (The major leaguers, if you will)  The rest of the orchestra is just variations on the minor leagues.  The minor leaguers are only asked to play the notes of which they are capable, which if we are honest is probably 75% of the notes.  

So now 1% seems much less impressive, doesn’t it? 

We could carry on with who gets solos and then gets to be a solo act but the nut of the matter is that in both music and umpiring it’s not the notes/calls that are wrong but rather the timing of the mistakes.  A poorly timed gong is always a daywrecker. 

On the topic of Erod, he needs to unlock the ability Joe Mauer never could.  When you get a cookie early in the count, destroy it.  Pull it foul, who cares.  Electronic strike zone or not, control the count by being aggressive when you get the chance. 

[Rod Carews Birthday]

2 minutes ago, Jocko87 said:

Using your orchestra analogy, how many of the musicians are asked to play every note? None.  How many are asked to play the most complicated notes? A select few.  (The major leaguers, if you will)  The rest of the orchestra is just variations on the minor leagues.  The minor leaguers are only asked to play the notes of which they are capable, which if we are honest is probably 75% of the notes.  

So now 1% seems much less impressive, doesn’t it? 

-----------------------snip--------------------------

On the topic of Erod, he needs to unlock the ability Joe Mauer never could.  When you get a cookie early in the count, destroy it.  Pull it foul, who cares.  Electronic strike zone or not, control the count by being aggressive when you get the chance. 

Last thing first. . . I like the comparison with Mauer in that he never really developed the ability to destroy the early cookie.  If he had been able to do that, he would have gone from Hall of Famer to "inner circle" Hall of Famer.  A career like that of Mauer would be a dream!

However, I'm pretty sure your description of a professional symphony orchestra is not very accurate (at least not ones the caliber of the Minnesota Orchestra or the Chicago Symphony).  The type of music they play is such that all of the players have complicated parts to play.  The thought that only a select few can play all of the notes is a long ways from reality unless the orchestra you are talking about is a middle school orchestra. Last time I checked middle school baseball players aren't minor leaguers, or even close.  A professional orchestral player is able to and expected to play all of the notes, not just 75%.   So, yes.  One percent is pretty impressive.  Yes, calling balls and strikes is difficult, but we should be talking about the very best of the very best umpires, not just a bunch of guys off the street.  They need to up their game or get out of the way and let automation take over. 

[RpR]

36 minutes ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

Last thing first. . . I like the comparison with Mauer in that he never really developed the ability to destroy the early cookie.  If he had been able to do that, he would have gone from Hall of Famer to "inner circle" Hall of Famer.  A career like that of Mauer would be a dream!

However, I'm pretty sure your description of a professional symphony orchestra is not very accurate (at least not ones the caliber of the Minnesota Orchestra or the Chicago Symphony).  The type of music they play is such that all of the players have complicated parts to play.  The thought that only a select few can play all of the notes is a long ways from reality unless the orchestra you are talking about is a middle school orchestra. Last time I checked middle school baseball players aren't minor leaguers, or even close.  A professional orchestral player is able to and expected to play all of the notes, not just 75%.   So, yes.  One percent is pretty impressive.  Yes, calling balls and strikes is difficult, but we should be talking about the very best of the very best umpires, not just a bunch of guys off the street.  They need to up their game or get out of the way and let automation take over. 

Jocko is analogy is actually mostly correct.

Only a select few get certain parts of a number and the only notes ones plays are those  his/her section plays, not every note, while the concertmaster is the most important instrument player in the orchestra (1st Violin sitting closest to the conductor;he/she reads, during a performance , the conductor's ideas and communicates them to the rest of the orchestra.)

[Rod Carews Birthday]

6 minutes ago, RpR said:

Jocko is analogy is actually mostly correct.

Only a select few get certain parts of a number and the only notes ones plays are those  his/her section plays, not every note, while the concertmaster is the most important instrument player in the orchestra (1st Violin sitting closest to the conductor;he/she reads, during a performance , the conductor's ideas and communicates them to the rest of the orchestra.)

Obviously this stream of thought has gone way off the path, and for that I apologize to the original author, any moderators, and anyone else who got drawn into this.  My original intent was to demonstrate that sometimes, what seems like a high number (97%) isn't actually that great in context.  Maybe I needed to be more direct and less esoteric.  Would you be satisfied with an airline pilot who only crashed 3% of the time? I think not, and we shouldn't be satisfied with that either. 

Now back to silly season.  I have more than 40 years of experience both playing in and conducting bands and orchestras at many levels of achievement.  I know how they work.  I was speaking from real world experience. This description cherry picks information and then misinterprets it into all levels of distortion.  It's really OK.  You can disagree with me about umpire accuracy and not approve of my analogy.  I will not continue it. 

[twinstalker]

Juan Soto is not a 99th percentile comp for EmRod.  It's an impossibility.  The predictive stats don't allow for it.  They're in different worlds.  Soto struck out at an approx 13% rate as a 17 yr old in rookie ball, while EmRod struck out at a 36% rate as an 18 year old.  EmRod was often passive.  Soto was aggressive.  Soto's walk rate in the minors has more to do with pitchers not wanting to pitch to him.

Jenkins isn't Soto in best case scenario, either, but he's much closer.  Anyway, my argument is petty because you don't really mean 99th percentile.  You basically say it's unreachable.  You might as well make Soto the out of this world comp for any prospect.

Schwarber is an interesting ceiling comp for EmRod, one being a catcher, the other being a CF, and both ending up in the corner OF, probably.  I tried to find issues with the Ian Happ comp, but it's not bad as a 50th percentile.  I will argue with the Gallo floor.  If EmRod doesn't make contact (like Gallo), he won't be an all-star and have a slug over .500 for his first couple thousand plate appearance.  Gallo was a heckuva player for four years.  EmRod isn't guaranteed that sort of production, but I don't have a name off the top of my head who would be a good floor.

[bean5302]

I expect Emmanuel Rodriguez will be late career Joey Gallo with Byron Buxton's durability. If Rodriguez strikes out less than 40% of the time at the MLB level, I'd be quite surprised.

I think Schwarber is Emma's ceiling with later Joey Gallo being the likely outcome. The floor is probably more in line with Will Benson last year.

[tony&rodney]

57 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

I expect Emmanuel Rodriguez will be late career Joey Gallo with Byron Buxton's durability. If Rodriguez strikes out less than 40% of the time at the MLB level, I'd be quite surprised.

I think Schwarber is Emma's ceiling with later Joey Gallo being the likely outcome. The floor is probably more in line with Will Benson last year.

The guesses are all over the place. I'm hoping he gets his shot and then we will shall have an answer.

[Mydaughterhastwins]

6 hours ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

While that sounds like an excellent record, it’s actually not.  Generously, more than 50% of balls and strikes are easy calls, so that means that that success rate drops down to less than 94% for balls that are actually borderline.  Seems less impressive now doesn’t it?  

Let me put this another way.  In my real life, I am a musician (a conductor actually — insert joke here).  If you go hear the Minnesota Orchestra, or where I live, the Chicago Symphony, how many mistakes do you think those musicians make?  On a note by note basis, it’s way less than 1% and probably less than 1/10 of 1%.  They should be able to do that, because those players are absolutely at the top of their game.  They’re major leaguers, if you will.  To me, that means major league umpires should be able to do that as well.  

Now let me scare you.  A number of years ago, a company published a piece of music for high school band with mistakes written intentionally into the music just to prove a point about music education and the accuracy it involves compared to other subjects, like math.  The number of mistakes were about 5% and when the band played the music it was awful — unrecognizable and unlistenable.  I can’t easily draw the line from high school musician to professional umpire, but it does make you think a little.  

Back to Mr. Rodriguez. . . I agree with @ashbury that this is a terribly difficult one to predict because of the crazy amount of walks in his game.  I too doubt that the (soon to be) lost walks will just translate into equal production, but I would guess that a certain amount of it will.  My “realistic” pie in the sky comp for ERod is Curtis Granderson — a guy who hit a lot of home runs, struck out and walked a lot, but was athletic enough to also hit a lot of doubles and triples as well as steal a few bases.  At a career of over 40 WAR it puts him in the Hall of Very Good and I would be beyond thrilled with that outcome.  My floor is not a very happy one, because it hasn’t been identified yet.  It’s probably Eduard Julien.  Right now he’s teetering between figuring it out and becoming a successful major leaguer and not figuring it out and becoming a bust.  When we know Julien’s floor, then we will probably know Rodriguez’s floor as well.  Argh.

 

Twins Daily needs to hire this guy!

[Jocko87]

4 hours ago, Rod Carews Birthday said:

Obviously this stream of thought has gone way off the path, and for that I apologize to the original author, any moderators, and anyone else who got drawn into this.  My original intent was to demonstrate that sometimes, what seems like a high number (97%) isn't actually that great in context.  Maybe I needed to be more direct and less esoteric.  Would you be satisfied with an airline pilot who only crashed 3% of the time? I think not, and we shouldn't be satisfied with that either. 

Now back to silly season.  I have more than 40 years of experience both playing in and conducting bands and orchestras at many levels of achievement.  I know how they work.  I was speaking from real world experience. This description cherry picks information and then misinterprets it into all levels of distortion.  It's really OK.  You can disagree with me about umpire accuracy and not approve of my analogy.  I will not continue it. 

Interesting to bring aviation into it, as that is my career expertise.  The point of view is really the only thing that matters.  You got off your plane and assume success.  The industry professional understands degree of difficulty and level of talent/luck/ability/retraining requirements that went into that success.  We have a saying-any landing everyone can walk away from is a good landing, if we can reuse the plane it’s a great landing.  

In the same way, you notice many more mistakes by the orchestra than the average listener but we all know when an obvious error is made.  I’m certainly not trying to jump on your area of expertise but I do know without doubt that within any group of high performers, from the New York Philharmonic to the Poughkeepsie municipal to the Blue Angles to the budget regional, there is a hierarchy of abilities within that group.  And every single group has a top and bottom performer-it’s not optional.  Within this structure, different things are required to that ranking.  At the top of the scale, the gap is smaller, but the gap is always there.  A quick check of the Philharmonic pay scale and first violin structure confirms that for me.  

That’s all a bit of distraction though, and I should have made the point this way in the first place.  A 0.1 to 1% error rate for something one spends the majority of their waking hours practicing over and over again is basic expectation at the highest levels.  A 97% success rate on an instant reaction to something that you aren’t sure what is coming is actually pretty darn impressive.  We think we can see better than umpires and know everything with slow-mo and multiple cameras but the reality is we are just in the mosh pit cursing the concertmaster. 

It is a very interesting discussion though, probably better continued in the thread below.  We’ve been having this very discussion for a while now about how we can use numbers better.  Come on over.  Moderation could move these posts as well.

As for Erod, if we are still going into an umpire discussion a year from now he’s already sunk.  No good players career has ever been derailed by a strike zone variation. 

[old nurse]

Somehow I missed how playing an instrument, with sheet music in front of you, that has been practiced is akin to judging where an object traveling at about 130 feet per second in a non linear motion actual is in relation a spot  FWIW, when the object travels i a linear fashion the person standing next to the spot puts the object where the fans can get it.  The article I looked at previously talked about what a dead guy did 50-70 years ago with buses. Now that is quite the baseball story. Time to give this site a rest 

[NYCTK]

22 minutes ago, old nurse said:

Somehow I missed how playing an instrument, with sheet music in front of you, that has been practiced is akin to judging where an object traveling at about 130 feet per second in a o linear motion actual is in relation a spot  FWIW, when the object travels i a linear fashion the person standing next to the spot puts the object where the fans can get it.  The article I looked at previously talked about what a dead guy did 50-70 years ago with buses. Now that is quite the baseball story. Time to give this site a rest 

I mean...it's the offseason and we all knew the Twins weren't doing anything. So, I don't know what you expect. 

Anyways, Fangraphs posted the Twins ZiPS projections! Rodriguez has a very weird line of 211/343/397. Seems about right. He's going to be a very, very frustrating player. 

 

[LambchoP]

While I would love it if E Rod makes his debut and immediately becomes an impact player, I think it's a long shot. He hasn't tried to hit in AAA yet and really he only has what, less than half a season at AA? I think it's a bit early to talk about his debut. Let's see if he can hit in St Paul and more importantly, stay on the field.

[tony&rodney]

18 minutes ago, NYCTK said:

Rodriguez has a very weird line of 211/343/397. Seems about right. He's going to be a very, very frustrating player. 

 

ZiPS is always interesting to look over. Jeffers, and Lewis project to be mol the same with a 108 OPS+.

My take has been simplified to who can catch the ball and give the team the best opportunity to score runs. Thus, I would stick Emmanuel in the lineup right away.

[NYCTK]

7 minutes ago, tony&rodney said:

ZiPS is always interesting to look over. Jeffers, and Lewis project to be mol the same with a 108 OPS+.

My take has been simplified to who can catch the ball and give the team the best opportunity to score runs. Thus, I would stick Emmanuel in the lineup right away.

It's a great little escape in the winter. ZiPS has the best roster as something like this:

C	Ryan Jeffers
1B	Edouard Julien
2B	Luke Keaschall
3B	Royce Lewis
SS	Carlos Correa
LF	Matt Wallner
CF	Byron Buxton
RF	Emmanuel Rodriguez
DH	Gasper, Mickey
C2	Christian Vázquez
IF	Willi Castro
OF	Trevor Larnach
B4	José Miranda