Arbitration Decisions Looming

Pretty much the only reason that a team wouldn't offer arbitration to a starter like Odorizzi is if they had an absolutely stacked rotation where there was a better option. His stats are unimpressive but nothing kills a season faster than having 2-3 revolving doors in the rotation.

OBP probably most unappreciated stat in baseball. It correlates with wins better than SLG and AVG. Working long counts and making the pitcher throw a lot of pitches in an at bat is a relative weakness on the Twins. While not appreciated Grossman has a track record of getting on base and drawing walks better than most of the roster. Who would you project to have a better OBP next year? I can’t think of anyone. I think I would tender his contract.

Here’s to hoping that the FO can somehow work out a trade involving Grossman and Odorizzi before the tomorrow’s deadline. Unfortunately, dealing Grossman will be tough, but the Twins shouldn’t have a problem finding a taker for Odorizzi as teams like Toronto and Oakland could sure use some starting pitching.

With Cron getting tendered, I can't see Grossman getting tendered. Other than being a liability in the outfield and being fit best for DH'ing, his bat just isn't that good. Check out his 2018 splits:

 

Grossman 2018 March to August 5th: .253/.332/.365 (.697 OPS)

Coming off DL August 21th-Sept: .319/.442/.429 (.871 OPS)

 

Nearly all of Robbie's 2018 hitting production came when the season was already over and the Twins were facing some bad pitchers from the Central division in late August/September. He had a .649 OPS from March to the end of June. I'll pass, we already have two 1B/DH guys who should both hit better than Grossman in 2018. OBP is good, but not at the cost of bad defense and little baserunning ability.

Grossman has a long track record of solid on base skills. You don’t need to value that skill but partial season slash stat splits are not enough sample to support an different conclusion. He can get on base. That skill has value. He might not bring enough other value but I don’t see many guys on this team that will work a count and draw a walk.

If the plan is to bring in a guy with power and on base skills I am all in.

I liked your post and really can't disagree with you. And Grossman does offer value. I just don't feel he offers enough value to keep around, especially with the addition of Cron, which I happen to like. I'd be more in favor of keeping Grossman if Sano and Buxton were coming off solid seasons. The lineup would seem so much mkre complete we could afford to keep Grossman as a role player. I just feel he's too one dimensional to fit at this point. We need to find improvement to the roster in different ways.

Note: were he to agree to a much smaller contract, or be released and re-signed on a small, or even milb deal, I wouldn't be entirely opposed to him being brought to camp.

I am fine keeping Grossman but that means someone else (like Austin is out the door). I do like what he contributes within the narrow scope of what he does well. The problem like you say is that he has a very narrow list of positives.

Interesting set of concepts as I also value OBP and long at bats.  However unless you field 9 players with those skills (an interesting concept to chew up opposing pitching staffs), one or two of those type of players will not move the needle.  Will see and hope the Twins make some trades today, but do not see much movement from them.  Grossman is the only Twins player I can see nontendering.  Oderizzi would cost as much or more to replace with someone that is as good, and would also tell me the Twins are going the evaluation route in 2019.  Hope the Twins use some of the minor league depth (on one minor league list they had 21 B- or better players in their system), most teams do not get to 10. Let's see some deals and at the end of the day will have a better picture of where the Twins are going.  

Twins need to clear room on the 40 man and move some players not going to be here in 2020 for more controllable assets, so if some of these possible nontenders would be shipped out, would not cause a great deal of pain here.

Looking at his 2018 stats - Grossman did much better hitting against Lefthanders - we now have Cron and Austin battling for that role and the roster does not that redundancy.   I like his patient AB's and OBP but not having a good clear defensive position and $4M  tilts the scales to non-tender.  

Pretty much the only reason that a team wouldn't offer arbitration to a starter like Odorizzi is if they had an absolutely stacked rotation where there was a better option. His stats are unimpressive but nothing kills a season faster than having 2-3 revolving doors in the rotation.

I am not a huge Ordorizzi fan.

But he was 26th in the American league in innings, 20th in K's, 24th in ERA, and 49th in WAR (including relief pitchers)

in 2018 that that places him in a low end #2 or high end #3 role in the American league, I find it interesting on how Twins fans some how magically think the twins prospects are going to be anywhere close to as good as that, history shows that doesn't happen.

I also find it interesting with all the stats out there, no one wants to look one of the most important ones and that is the percentage of prospects that don't live up to the hype.

C.j. Cron signing I believe will be another signing similar to last years Morrison signing by this front office the stat numbers look great but when we get on the field his numbers won't hold up for the Twins. I find it ironic that same club had both these players and both times they just let them go even with there stats line. This telling me if Tampa is not willing to sign them again with the numbers they had it means there's something they know more about the players and it probably not going to be good signing. This Front office is all about numbers but you also have sight evaluation of the players too.  I think people here are so already sold on couple of players here for next year and my impression is we had short sample size for these players to already being ready to project them as future stars. The first is Cave he hit for average but I look at his major league numbers one thing that pops out to me is that he struck out nearly 1/3 of time with his at bats up with the Twins. If you would put it in full season he will strike out nearly as many times as Sano has been striking out. I just can't see how Twins have the at bats for type of hitter Cave is with that kind of strike out rate. Austin is other player he hits for power but that's about it he doesn't get on base much otherwise has low on base percentage he doesn't walk much you have all or nothing hitter. Probably why NY game up on him he needs work and they have plenty other candidates in the wings and I believe same to be true with the Twins. I just don't see how we have improved our selves with these moves for the coming year we have team to me is way to loaded with strike out potential all way through the line up. The loss of Grossman to me is who in this Twins line up can give you a professional at bat now. The two best we have is Polanco and Kepler and if the fans have there way Kepler would be gone now because he hasn't improved as much as everyone though he might this past year. Everyone thinks your past your prime if you haven't reached it by 25 but truth is most players don't hit there prime until 27 to 32 years in the majors. Look at Hicks it took to his 27 year to breakout become the star we thought he would when we drafted him. The sad thing there is we didn't get the player  back in trade because we were looking for catcher to fit are financials and one that had team control. Here again the numbers looked good for small sample size but didn't prove out when we played regularly. I just don't see where were improving this club at the major league level it may be better down in lower parts of the organization but we still won't know for number years on this either. I don't think were going to sign much for free agents this winter either were in holding pattern to determine where Sano and Buxton are before any investment is made in this club.   

Grossman has a long track record of solid on base skills. You don’t need to value that skill but partial season slash stat splits are not enough sample to support an different conclusion. He can get on base. That skill has value. He might not bring enough other value but I don’t see many guys on this team that will work a count and draw a walk.

 

If the plan is to bring in a guy with power and on base skills I am all in.

Ironically, one guy who does that pretty well is also a guy that many on this forum want benched: Max Kepler. His BB rate was second only to Grossman’s. His K rate was also lowest among all Twins hitters with more than 25 at bats except for Willians Astudillo.

Ironically, one guy who does that pretty well is also a guy that many on this forum want benched: Max Kepler. His BB rate was second only to Grossman’s. His K rate was also lowest among all Twins hitters with more than 25 at bats except for Willians Astudillo.

Looking at the Steamer projections, Kepler is projected for the most WAR among the batters and has a WOBA projection second on the team following Cron. I definitely am not in favor of benching Kepler for the same reason I was hopeful about Hicks. It is really hard to improve the plate discipline skill at the major league level. Hicks had that skill and needed to learn how to jump on pitches he could attack rather than work the count every time. Kepler is in that same place.

You really don't see a need to sign any of these guys longterm, especially with the attitude coming out of the front office that these are players of yore and MAYBE not the future of the team, as they see it...and any arbitration salaries for the future will be happily accepted or the players moved before they become too expensive. Except Berrios.