Twins 5, Angels 1: Simeon Woods Richardson and the Twins Bullpen Silence the Halos

[Steven Trefz]

After losing phenom Luke Keaschall to a broken arm Friday night, the Twins came into Saturday's tilt against the Angels victorious but deflated. Yusei Kikuchi got the start for the Halos, and he did his best to lift the Twins' spirits and batting averages. Here's how the latest Minnesota victory unfolded.

Image courtesy of © Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

Box Score
Starting Pitcher: Simeon Woods Richardson 5 1/3 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K (86 pitches, 53 strikes (62%))
Home Runs: N/A
Top 3 WPA: Woods Richardson (.155), Jonah Bride (.074), Ryan Jeffers (.073)

Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs) 
 

Something had to give Saturday afternoon. The Twins got the bats going Friday night against the Angels, scoring one more run than they had their entire three game series against the White Sox. The Angels tried to bust this momentum with a left-handed starter in Yusei Kikuchi. Simeon Woods Richardson got the start after the opener experiment in his last game didn't deserve a re-try, in hopes that he could take the ball deeper into the game and keep the Angels offense at bay. That's a lot of hopes and dreams from two losing teams, so someone was bound to be disappointed.

Death by Papercut
Woods Richardson held serve in the top of the first inning, keeping a swiping Zach Neto stuck at third base without surrendering a run. Kikuchi didn't give up anything horrific in the bottom of the first inning, but he sure gave up a lot of little singles. Six to be precise! Ryan Jeffers led off the barrage with a single, then Byron Buxton followed suit to put runners on the corners with nobody out. Carlos Correa has the most hits of any human against Kikuchi in his career, and he added one more to make it 1-0 Twins. Ty France joined the party with a single to plate Buxton and make it 2-0. After a Trevor Larnach double-play grounder that didn't make it through the infield, Jonah Bride came up with hit number six to score Correa and stake Woods Richardson to an early 3-0 advantage.

Kikuchi's woes continued into the bottom of the second, when control issues led to eventually another runner in scoring position for Correa with one out. You know who still owns Kikuchi? C4 does. 4-0 Twins.
 

Missed Opportunities
One of the April lowlights for the Twins has been their batting with the bases loaded. After Correa's RBI single, the Twins once again loaded the bases, only to see Brooks Lee ground out to end the threat. After Zach Neto laced a 3-1 slider into the seats to put the Angels on the board in the top of the third inning, the Twins found themselves right back at the doorstep of a blowout with the bases loaded and nobody out in the bottom of the third. Buxton got the first crack at putting the game away but struck out on three pitches against reliever Ryan Johnson. Correa watched strike three go by on a full count. France couldn't pick up his teammates as he ground out easily to end the threat. Kikuchi was on the ropes his entire start, surrendering nine hits and issuing four walks in only two innings completed. Yet the score was only 4-1 Twins heading into the middle innings. Would these missed bases loaded opportunities come back to haunt Minnesota?

More of the Same. and Something New
Woods Richardson entered the top of the sixth inning on cruise control and under 80 pitches, but a Neto single with Mike Trout up next was all it took to prevent Simeon from yet another chance at completing six innings. Brock Stewart came in and struck out Trout and induced Ward into a harmless flyball to end the threat. 

Trout is a fresh and new right fielder this season, and France took advantage of a rough route by Trout for a gift double to lead off the bottom of the sixth. After Larnach and Bride failed to cash in on the opportunity yet again, Lee aimed a line drive towards Trout again, and again the ball found the grass for a double and an RBI to stretch the lead to 5-1.

Closing it Out
The streaky Twins bullpen looked to close the door on the Angels and to earn the fourth victory in the last five outings. Griffin Jax once again got the call in the seventh inning, and he struck out three batters before and after a J.D. Davis single to silence the Angels. Louis Varland took the hill in the eighth, and he faced the minimum. Jhoan Duran came in for a non-save situation in the ninth, and seven pitches later three Angels were out and the Twins won a ho-hum easy victory just like it was drawn up. 

News and Notes
Bride went 2-for-4 today for his first multi-hit game of the season. Harrison Bader snapped an 0-for-16 streak with two hits on Saturday. Newest Twin Kody Clemens was in the dugout but didn't get a chance to make his Twins debut.

What’s Next?
The Twins look to take their first series at home, and first since week one of the season by taking game three Wednesday afternoon. Twins righty Joe Ryan (1-2, 4.00 ERA) takes the hill in hopes of washing away the stain of Atlanta's home run debacle,  while the Angels counter with righty Jose Soriano (2-3, 4.34 ERA). First pitch is scheduled for 12:40pm CDT.

Postgame Interviews

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	TOT
Jax	13	14	0	0	19	46
Varland	7	0	0	20	19	46
Alcalá	0	0	41	0	0	41
Durán	32	0	0	0	7	39
Sands	0	17	0	13	0	30
Stewart	0	20	0	0	6	26
Coulombe	0	13	0	12	0	25
Topa	0	6	0	15	0	21

 

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[bean5302]

Baldelli doing his absolute best to wipe the bullpen out at record speed. SWR's last fastball was 94mph. 86 pitches. Mid inning. 3 run lead.

[Blyleven2011]

Houston we still have a problem  , how do we solve the problem of scoring runners with no outs ...

Good game for Sim,  and a win for the twins  ...

It did put me to sleep again for an afternoon nap ...

In the standings the twins are distancing themselves between the white Sox  for the cellar dwellers ...

Colorado the worst team with only 4 wins ...

[bean5302]

Solid game overall. SWR was rolling on one of his best ever starts, and solid small ball run support from the lineup. Nothing flashy, just a solid win!

[Parfigliano]

22 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

Baldelli doing his absolute best to wipe the bullpen out at record speed. SWR's last fastball was 94mph. 86 pitches. Mid inning. 3 run lead.

I didn't like the decision

[RpR]

The newbies all got 2 hits, and, so did Correa, this is the start of some thing BIG.

[mnfireman]

1 hour ago, bean5302 said:

Baldelli doing his absolute best to wipe the bullpen out at record speed. SWR's last fastball was 94mph. 86 pitches. Mid inning. 3 run lead.

Stewart threw 6 pitches, he should be available tomorrow. SWR wore down towards the end of last season, if he can save a few bullets early, let him.

[bean5302]

Just now, mnfireman said:

...SWR wore down towards the end of last season, if he can save a few bullets early, let him.

It's not about Stewart throwing 6 pitches, it's about needing a reliever for the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th innings. SWR showed signs of dead arm at 120 innings. If his limit is 86 pitches, he should be in the bullpen. We've seen Baldelli destroy his bullpen year after year with short starts and we've watched the late season collapses that come from it.

[stringer bell]

Eight-man BP allows two consecutive four reliever days. The only guy that has had an unsustainable workload would be Varland. If the team has 7-8 decent options, no one will be overworked. The problem is when only a couple guys are considered reliable. 
 

At this point, the only guy I definitely don’t want to see in a tight game is Alcalá. 

[whosafraidofluigirussolo]

4 hours ago, bean5302 said:

We've seen Baldelli destroy his bullpen year after year with short starts and we've watched the late season collapses that come from it.

This season (such as it is, at this early stage) is the first since 2022 where the Twins have been below league average in innings per start

[Mark G]

4 hours ago, whosafraidofluigirussolo said:

This season (such as it is, at this early stage) is the first since 2022 where the Twins have been below league average in innings per start

I am not sure I would use the word destroy as my choice of semantics, but I concur with Bean5302 100% as to bullpen usage.  As he stated, the number of pitches each reliever throws in each game is not the point; the point is we are playing with fire every game we use 4 or 5 (or more?) pitchers in a game, regardless of pitch count for either the pen or the starter.  

If a starter stays healthy and pitches his every 5 games, he will start 32 (give or take 1) games over the course of the season.  That is 32 times we are hoping he will have his best stuff and can keep us in the game and give us a chance to win.  When he does not have his best stuff and is getting roughed up, we take him out and hope the bullpen can keep the lid on until we can score some runs.  When he does have his best stuff we should be riding that start as long as possible, limiting the number of pitchers we have to use that game.  Again, pitch count has nothing to do with either the starter or the pen; it is counting on each pitcher in the game to have their good stuff to get us through and win the game.  A starter only pitches in 32 games; a reliever who stays healthy all year and is used as often as we use ours will enter anywhere from 50ish games to possibly 70ish, meaning we are hoping he has his best stuff approx. twice as often as any of our starters.  If any one of the guys from the pen on any given day has a bad outing, runs score and games can be lost.  Why, then, would we want to average 3-4 relievers a game all season long when our starter has his good stuff?  He will come out early on the days he does not, and stay in on the days he does; it will even out in the end, and the pen will not be taxed to the degree we tax ours.  When plan A is to use 3-5 pitchers a game, every game, there is no way around the fact the pen will be taxed beyond what would be considered desirable.  Of course we should pull the starter when he is off, but we should also ride him when he is on fire; the pitch count will even out over the course of the season.  Pitch counts don't matter for relievers, nor do innings pitched, anywhere near as much as number of games pitched in, which is the number of times he can affect the outcome of the game, good or bad.  And that is going to be high when we use the pen 40-45% of all innings pitched, which we will with Plan A.  

And round and round it goes; where it stops, nobody knows.  😉

[Doctor Wu]

Well, at least we out-hit them and scored some more runs this game, but 13 players LOB is not an encouraging stat. But hey, let's keep the momentum and go for that sweep tomorrow!

[mikelink45]

I think that we have to really consider how our team wore down last year and think about the posts above questioning our use of relievers.  We have played 27 games so far.  This is how often our top relievers have been called on so far:

Varland 14

Duran 12

Sands 12

Jax 12

Columbe 12

Alcala 10

Topa 10

The first 27 games - 16% of the season! Varland has been over 50% of the games.  Tell me this is sustainable.  

[JD-TWINS]

14 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Baldelli doing his absolute best to wipe the bullpen out at record speed. SWR's last fastball was 94mph. 86 pitches. Mid inning. 3 run lead.

Guy on base and multi time former MVP coming up and SWR was living by his 4 seamer on Saturday…… not the best match-up to get out of an inning unscathed. Stewart came in and threw 6 pitches. I just do not understand the issue with the bullpen use?

Varland is on pace for 84 innings - that’s a bunch for many PEN guys but Varland has been a starter until now and is a horse……still, he is at top end usage with this approach.

Duran is on pace to throw 67 innings & Jax is on pace to throw 66 innings.

Sands - Alcala - Coulombe are on pace for 60-61 innings ……… Topa 55 innings.

Starters typically throw more innings after first handful of starts.

Where’s the abuse? Is the expectation for these guys to throw less innings than shown here? 26 weeks in the regular season …… 68 innings over the year is 2.62 innings per 7 day week………I’ve posted these same comments 4 times in last couple weeks…….I don’t get what I’m missing?

Typical for a minimum of 3 PEN arms per game……..get used to it as it isn’t changing. 2024 - 5.24 innings per start across MLB….. Twins were at 5.26 innings per start. SWR was 5.33 innings in yesterday ……… pretty standard move going to Stewart.

[JD-TWINS]

3 hours ago, Mark G said:

I am not sure I would use the word destroy as my choice of semantics, but I concur with Bean5302 100% as to bullpen usage.  As he stated, the number of pitches each reliever throws in each game is not the point; the point is we are playing with fire every game we use 4 or 5 (or more?) pitchers in a game, regardless of pitch count for either the pen or the starter.  

If a starter stays healthy and pitches his every 5 games, he will start 32 (give or take 1) games over the course of the season.  That is 32 times we are hoping he will have his best stuff and can keep us in the game and give us a chance to win.  When he does not have his best stuff and is getting roughed up, we take him out and hope the bullpen can keep the lid on until we can score some runs.  When he does have his best stuff we should be riding that start as long as possible, limiting the number of pitchers we have to use that game.  Again, pitch count has nothing to do with either the starter or the pen; it is counting on each pitcher in the game to have their good stuff to get us through and win the game.  A starter only pitches in 32 games; a reliever who stays healthy all year and is used as often as we use ours will enter anywhere from 50ish games to possibly 70ish, meaning we are hoping he has his best stuff approx. twice as often as any of our starters.  If any one of the guys from the pen on any given day has a bad outing, runs score and games can be lost.  Why, then, would we want to average 3-4 relievers a game all season long when our starter has his good stuff?  He will come out early on the days he does not, and stay in on the days he does; it will even out in the end, and the pen will not be taxed to the degree we tax ours.  When plan A is to use 3-5 pitchers a game, every game, there is no way around the fact the pen will be taxed beyond what would be considered desirable.  Of course we should pull the starter when he is off, but we should also ride him when he is on fire; the pitch count will even out over the course of the season.  Pitch counts don't matter for relievers, nor do innings pitched, anywhere near as much as number of games pitched in, which is the number of times he can affect the outcome of the game, good or bad.  And that is going to be high when we use the pen 40-45% of all innings pitched, which we will with Plan A.  

And round and round it goes; where it stops, nobody knows.  😉

It’s April 26th.

As you state, Team is at or higher than MLB average in starter innings in recent 2 seasons.

The point that I assume everyone understands is that a reliever’s potential to be sharp or even just “serviceable” is a much higher % since his outing is going to be an assumed 8-25 pitches based on effectiveness that day. Max effort 2-3 innings per week breeds much more success.

Other than Varland, nobody projects more than 67 innings over the season. I gotta disagree that innings for relievers are moot. If a guy throws 1 2/3 one day and another 2 innings 3 days later his potential to keep runs surrendered down is not as good as if he throws 1 inning 3 times over 7 days…….this is treating “relievers” all the same and not distinguishing long guys v. short ……. relievers that are tailored to face 3-5 guys per inning are going to have better outing to outing ERA success than guys that “pitch less often” and throw to 6-11 guys and get more outs per outing.

Look at the Guardians PEN usage. They have a potential problem with games pitched and reliever innings - 7 guys  with 60-75 appearances (5 guys at 72 innings plus and same # of potential appearances) ……. pretty different look than Rocco’s screwed up usage of his Pen.

[Mark G]

16 minutes ago, JD-TWINS said:

Guy on base and multi time former MVP coming up and SWR was living by his 4 seamer on Saturday…… not the best match-up to get out of an inning unscathed. Stewart came in and threw 6 pitches. I just do not understand the issue with the bullpen use?

Varland is on pace for 84 innings - that’s a bunch for many PEN guys but Varland has been a starter until now and is a horse……still, he is at top end usage with this approach.

Duran is on pace to throw 67 innings & Jax is on pace to throw 66 innings.

Sands - Alcala - Coulombe are on pace for 60-61 innings ……… Topa 55 innings.

Starters typically throw more innings after first handful of starts.

Where’s the abuse? Is the expectation for these guys to throw less innings than shown here? 26 weeks in the regular season …… 68 innings over the year is 2.62 innings per 7 day week………I’ve posted these same comments 4 times in last couple weeks…….I don’t get what I’m missing?

Typical for a minimum of 3 PEN arms per game……..get used to it as it isn’t changing. 2024 - 5.24 innings per start across MLB….. Twins were at 5.26 innings per start. SWR was 5.33 innings in yesterday ……… pretty standard move going to Stewart.

My question back would be: should it be?  Should that be standard?

If the starting rotation was the weak link of the team and was simply not very good, your post would make sense, and I would be riding the train you are on, not the one I am on.  But we are being told that our rotation is strong, very good in fact, so why do we want your stats to be plan A year in and year out?  Do we really want every one of those guys pitching that often?  And I still submit it is not the number of innings, or the number of pitches, but the number of appearances; the number of times in a season they need to have their stuff going for them or it can cost us a game.  And when 3-4 pen guys a game almost every game parade in, all it takes is one to blow up a close game if they are off.  On a team with a strong rotation, is the above usage you point to the most desirable plan?  

I have said this before as well, it is a debate that is worthy of having, but it cannot be won.  I am just glad it is respectful and logical.  ☺️

[LambchoP]

Really nice to get some wins, even if they've been against bad teams. Even nicer to see the offense start to wake up. Still a little concerned with hitting with RISP and leaving so many guys on base each game. Also a little concerned that our starting pitchers either cannot or are not allowed to pitch more than 5 innings. Using 4 or more relievers in a game greatly increases the chances that one of those guys will blow a lead and most likely the game. Hoping for a sweep today, because starting tomorrow we have to go up against a real team .....

[jmlease1]

Good grief, Rocco simply has no chance does he? He pulls the starter to snuff out a potential rally against one of the best players to ever play baseball (and who happens to be leading the league in homers), the bullpen gets the job done, and people are immediately jumping on him for burning out the bullpen. Pretty sure he would have gotten killed if he'd left SWR in there and the kid had given up a 2-run dinger too. Ain't no winning when some people just want the manager gone, I guess. I suspect they'd find a reason to hate the next guy too...

Correa had a good game, hopefully this means that he's getting his swing back on track. No complaints if he got well against the Angels.

13 hits and 5 BBs...you'd hope the Twins could scratch out more than 5 runs, but it's a reminder that it's a lot tougher to small ball your way to lots of runs; they only had 2 xbhs (both doubles). I suspect that if the hits keep coming that the power will be there. Thought the team had a pretty good approach at the plate.

Not a clean inning from Jax, but an effective one. Hopefully he's back on track. No complaints about him getting 3 K's. Still wish he had a guy in the bullpen who was trusted to go more than 1 inning; still feel like Varland could be that guy and it might ease things up a bit if he could go 2 innings from time to time, but if they're comfortable with him and other pitching so frequently, we might be ok. Liked seeing Duran be efficient and close it out like that.

[D.C Twins]

Hopefully this 'momentum' translates to real competition.

The Angles have wasted a generational talent in Trout 

[stringer bell]

1 hour ago, mikelink45 said:

I think that we have to really consider how our team wore down last year and think about the posts above questioning our use of relievers.  We have played 27 games so far.  This is how often our top relievers have been called on so far:

Varland 14

Duran 12

Sands 12

Jax 12

Columbe 12

Alcala 10

Topa 10

The first 27 games - 16% of the season! Varland has been over 50% of the games.  Tell me this is sustainable.  

I agree that using Varland that often is not sustainable, although he managed a scoreless outing on the second day of a back-to-back. I would say he is the only one. 72 appearances is at the high end of usage for most guys and that is the number that would be projected for the next four guys.

For varied reasons, all three of the top starters haven't been fully stretched out IMHO. López coming off the hammy strain, Ober slowed early by illness and Ryan returning from major injury and not used much in spring training. All three of these guys should be expected to usually pitch the sixth inning and often the seventh as the calendar turns to May, which should lessen the strain on the BP. So too would better offense. Five plus run leads would make it much easier to go with SWR, Paddack and minor league callups for an extra frame or two.

I should knock on wood here, but Twins' pitching injuries right now are low. Tonkin is on the IL and there's not really a place for him unless the Twins decide to jettison Alcalá. Their injuries are all on the position player side with Keaschall the only one projected to be out more than two weeks from now. More injuries will come and most likely they will cluster in one position group, but so far pitching and in particular bullpen health hasn't been a problem.

[jorgenswest]

2 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

I think that we have to really consider how our team wore down last year and think about the posts above questioning our use of relievers.  We have played 27 games so far.  This is how often our top relievers have been called on so far:

Varland 14

Duran 12

Sands 12

Jax 12

Columbe 12

Alcala 10

Topa 10

The first 27 games - 16% of the season! Varland has been over 50% of the games.  Tell me this is sustainable.  

I can’t.

I can tell you that the Dodgers have more innings from their bullpen than any other team this year. Last year it was the same. The Twins are 7th but in front of them are two other teams having a good season with the Cubs and Mariners joining the Dodgers.

Individually Varland’s 14 innings would rank in the 22nd to 32nd spot. Second on the Twins by innings is Duran and he slots in 96 to 105 by inning use.

The leaders in games played at 15 pitch for the 17-11 Dodgers (Yates), the 17-10 Giants (Rogers) and the 12-15 Cardinals (Maton). Varland several others are next. There are 77 relievers that have pitched at least 12 games and 158 that have pitched at least 20 games. By team the top 3 in games from the pen are the Dodgers, Mariners and Cubs.

The source for this data is Fangraphs.

[JD-TWINS]

2 hours ago, Mark G said:

My question back would be: should it be?  Should that be standard?

If the starting rotation was the weak link of the team and was simply not very good, your post would make sense, and I would be riding the train you are on, not the one I am on.  But we are being told that our rotation is strong, very good in fact, so why do we want your stats to be plan A year in and year out?  Do we really want every one of those guys pitching that often?  And I still submit it is not the number of innings, or the number of pitches, but the number of appearances; the number of times in a season they need to have their stuff going for them or it can cost us a game.  And when 3-4 pen guys a game almost every game parade in, all it takes is one to blow up a close game if they are off.  On a team with a strong rotation, is the above usage you point to the most desirable plan?  

I have said this before as well, it is a debate that is worthy of having, but it cannot be won.  I am just glad it is respectful and logical.  ☺️

If the TWINS / ROCCO were on an island with Pen usage …. whether it be appearances or pitches or innings…… then I might be swayed. Twins use their starters and relievers as well or better than a big majority of successful teams.

Checkout the Guardians Pen usage.

Our staff is solid - talent amongst the Rotation guys but not necessarily a lot of guile via experience, at this point. Festa - SWR are “becoming every 5th day guys” ……. Lopez threw 5 innings with mediocre command in his first stint off the IL - no reason to push his innings.

Our Pen, on paper, is supposed to be Top 5 or close, so not to use them as needed or as the Manager sees fit, seems like a poor approach to me. IMO, if offense was worth 2 cents and we had another 3-4 wins, nobody would be worried about Pen appearances.

Paddack is not a 32 start guy (he’s not!) so they protect him - Festa is trying to become an every 5th day, 30 start guy - SWR is trying to build to 160 innings this year. All this is in the interest of keeping guys competitive over 162 games and trying to set team up to win as much as possible. There’s no Pennant Flag for being “Top 5 in starter innings” at end of September.

[bean5302]

12 hours ago, whosafraidofluigirussolo said:

This season (such as it is, at this early stage) is the first since 2022 where the Twins have been below league average in innings per start

Based on the "mean" not the median not the mode. The problem with mean is it distorts the most common outcomes.

MLB Rank for Starting Innings Pitched:
Tampa Bay Rays = 23rd (811 innings), 5.00 innings
Minnesota Twins = 14th (855 innings), 5.28 innings

Adjusted to remove openers.
Tampa Bay = 148 GS, 788.1 IP, 5.33 per start
Minnesota = 160 GS, 851.0 IP, 5.32 per start.

We were talking about mean vs. median. Let's compare the conventional starters and each individual mean to get an idea of the philosophy of each manager.
Tampa Bay = 5.39 (29), 5.52 (25), 5.00 (26), 5.78 (19), 5.11 (17), 5.67 (14), 5.07 (9), 4.71 (7)
Minnesota = 5.79 (32), 5.76 (31), 5.87 (23), 4.77 (28), 5.20 (17), 4.62 (13), 4.19 (9), 4.62 (7)

Bolded towards the end is the problem there. That's a WHOLE lot of commonly short starts. The Twins came out of the gate okay because Joe Ryan's early season starts were helping to get the bullpen some rest while SWR and Paddack wiped them out. But I'm going to tell you right now, over usage of the bullpen takes a harder hit on the pitchers recovery time and effectiveness than just using the mean recovery time. The Twins' bullpen was already at their limit when Joe Ryan went down, only to be replaced with guys who were making 4 inning starts.

Baldelli pulls guys too early.

[JD-TWINS]

15 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

Based on the "mean" not the median not the mode. The problem with mean is it distorts the most common outcomes.

MLB Rank for Starting Innings Pitched:
Tampa Bay Rays = 23rd (811 innings), 5.00 innings
Minnesota Twins = 14th (855 innings), 5.28 innings

Adjusted to remove openers.
Tampa Bay = 148 GS, 788.1 IP, 5.33 per start
Minnesota = 160 GS, 851.0 IP, 5.32 per start.

We were talking about mean vs. median. Let's compare the conventional starters and each individual mean to get an idea of the philosophy of each manager.
Tampa Bay = 5.39 (29), 5.52 (25), 5.00 (26), 5.78 (19), 5.11 (17), 5.67 (14), 5.07 (9), 4.71 (7)
Minnesota = 5.79 (32), 5.76 (31), 5.87 (23), 4.77 (28), 5.20 (17), 4.62 (13), 4.19 (9), 4.62 (7)

Bolded towards the end is the problem there. That's a WHOLE lot of commonly short starts. The Twins came out of the gate okay because Joe Ryan's early season starts were helping to get the bullpen some rest while SWR and Paddack wiped them out. But I'm going to tell you right now, over usage of the bullpen takes a harder hit on the pitchers recovery time and effectiveness than just using the mean recovery time. The Twins' bullpen was already at their limit when Joe Ryan went down, only to be replaced with guys who were making 4 inning starts.

Baldelli pulls guys too early.

I have a degree but took stats last in 1982 ……. not really sure what you are getting at with the parentheses, etc.? I can look at Baseball Reference and the number of appearances & innings for all the pitchers on the Staff are shown…….. there is nothing there regarding mode nor mean nor median…… simply appearances and innings. I see nothing in those numbers suggesting over use of the guys in the Pen………should the Guardian’s Manager be fired? Do the Guradians have some reliever superpowers?

Again, the Pen innings are an average of use across all games. If they use less Pen innings when Ober/Ryan/Lopez pitch, I would think that would be logical. MLB average in ‘23 & ‘24 for all starter innings was 5.18 & 5.24 ……… Twin’s starters were more than these (slightly) average innings per start both years.

Not sure why openers would be omitted? These starts certainly impact Pen innings greatly - maybe Twins don’t do it often & you’re leveling with Tampa specifically (for unknown reason?).

Anyway, we obviously see this issue differently. Probably not going to change.

[JD-TWINS]

17 hours ago, bean5302 said:

It's not about Stewart throwing 6 pitches, it's about needing a reliever for the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th innings. SWR showed signs of dead arm at 120 innings. If his limit is 86 pitches, he should be in the bullpen. We've seen Baldelli destroy his bullpen year after year with short starts and we've watched the late season collapses that come from it.

Last year’s failures were due to Ryan & Paddack not being available and thus forcing Festa & Matthews into action, neither prepared between the ears but the most talented of Team’s young group of options. The other hiccup was Varland proving (by late April) not to be valid as a starter. So, Team had a 23 year old that hadn’t thrown innings expected in the Show over season, forced into action - SWR, and Festa & Matthews. How does the Pen NOT get used regularly with these circumstances? The Manager would need to be David Copperfield to have it look any other way.

The Team’s collapse the last 6 weeks of the season in ‘24 was 90% offensive output (lack of) related……a subjective % from my viewpoint.

[bean5302]

1 hour ago, JD-TWINS said:

I have a degree but took stats last in 1982 ……. not really sure what you are getting at with the parentheses, etc.?...

In parenthesis is the number of starts that pitcher made to demonstrate how the Twins' rank in "average innings" is a poor data point.

John McMoneybags moves to Warba, MN. John McMoneybags made $1 billion dollars of income last year. The mean household income in Warba, MN becomes $5.5MM. You're saying people in Warba, MN are extremely well off. In fact, probably the highest income earners in the world! Meanwhile, the median household income is $10,000.

Baldelli pulled pitchers early with regularity. That's his M.O. Relievers being asked to pitch more frequently and for more innings than typical leads to fatigue and a reduction in performance. The Twins have collapsed late season several times under Baldelli. The bullpen has been below average 3 consecutive years in the 2nd half.