Matt Wallner: A Powerful Assessment

[Riverbrian]

I'm not posting this for a fire bombing of Matt Wallner...  I know he has lost some fans on this site.  

Wallner in this purpose, is an example for a front office assessment discussion. I'm not doing this to blame the front office either. Player assessment has to be difficult. 

Thought #1 - Matt Wallner was CHOSEN as the opening day RF. He wasn't even originally chosen to platoon. The staff went around the room... talked about it and concluded that Wallner was the opening day RF. 

Thought #2 - Matt Wallner remained the designated starter for 43 games. The Twins staff determined that there was something there. 

Thought #3 - Poof... He's gone. Possibly for good if they decide not to retain him. 

Thought #4 - Any statcast metric considerations, any measurements, any projections would have been part of the discussion for the consideration of thought #1 and thought #2. Is he our RF? They said yes... he is our RF. 

Thought #5 - Poof... He's gone. 

How can a front office miss that badly? From the keys to the kingdom to Poof... He's Gone. It wasn't gradual... It was poof... he's gone. 

 

 

[Cory Engelhardt]

16 minutes ago, Riverbrian said:

I'm not posting this for a fire bombing of Matt Wallner...  I know he has lost some fans on this site.  

Wallner in this purpose, is an example for a front office assessment discussion. I'm not doing this to blame the front office either. Player assessment has to be difficult. 

Thought #1 - Matt Wallner was CHOSEN as the opening day RF. He wasn't even originally chosen to platoon. The staff went around the room... talked about it and concluded that Wallner was the opening day RF. 

Thought #2 - Matt Wallner remained the designated starter for 43 games. The Twins staff determined that there was something there. 

Thought #3 - Poof... He's gone. Possibly for good if they decide not to retain him. 

Thought #4 - Any statcast metric considerations, any measurements, any projections would have been part of the discussion for the consideration of thought #1 and thought #2. Is he our RF? They said yes... he is our RF. 

Thought #5 - Poof... He's gone. 

How can a front office miss that badly? From the keys to the kingdom to Poof... He's Gone. It wasn't gradual... It was poof... he's gone. 

 

 

This is a good question. He certainly never had great range, but the arm is very much there. Maybe a different hitting coach could help more. 

The strikeouts were also always part of his game, but he just stopped making any contact. Then Keaschall came up and lit the world on fire AND even though he was bad in the outfield, he certainly had better range than Wallner ever showed. Austin Martin too. And then of course both Jenkins AND Rodriguez clearly have better range.

If Wallner could get with a coach that truly fixes the hole in his swing, then he could be something again. I don't know what is up with him, but you are right, he was the guy until he wasn't.

[ashbury]

1 hour ago, Riverbrian said:

Thought #2 - Matt Wallner remained the designated starter for 43 games. 

It was a little more gradual than you portray it.  Wallner was the starter in the first 14 games of the season,. He played RF and was there for every inning. That definitely demonstrated conviction on the part of the braintrust.

He sat out game #15, having rewarded the braintrust with a .677 OPS.

After that, Wallner started in 19 of the next 28 games.  The FO and/or manager showed a certain kind of stubbornness by never DHing him even in this period, and when he played it was for the entire game, except one time he didn't start but came in to bat in the 9th inning.  He wasn't an everyday starter anymore but they still invested the month trying any way they could to let him show the value that they obviously thought was there in the first place, not jerking him around when he did play.

The reward for this additional patience was a .441 OPS.  Beyond unplayable.

No longer having a role on the major league roster even as a bench player - you can't bring him in for the bat, you can't bring him in for the glove, you can't bring him in to run the bases - he was indeed gone, and never came back.

But this wasn't a poof!-he-gone situation.  He was phased out until he positively played himself out of a job.

It's fair to ask whether the judgement going into Opening Day was that mistaken, and it's fair to question how long you go until you pull the plug.  But I think they are separate matters.

My own guess is that there was a conviction within the FO that if Wallner went to AAA, he wasn't coming back.  So they wanted to make really, really sure.