Gushing Over the Glovework of Polanco and Sano

Great article!  Sano's off-season commitment is really paying off.  Reps are important at any position.  Polanco is getting them consistently.

BTW:  Ozzie Smith didn't have a great arm.  Seemed OK  ;-)  

So good to see these two erase defensive doubts. If the last week or so of Rosario and Buxton continue, look what we have under 27 years old:

Grossman

Vargas

Sano

Polanco

Rosario

Buxton

Kepler

Yep, 7 starters. Dozier and Castro and Escobar with plenty of productive years left. And Garver, Gordon, Adrianza, Granite, and Palka on the brink. That's a solid lineup now and for years to come. Nice.

Great article and count me as one of the fans that is happy to eat my words about Sano and Polanco not being able to cut it at 3B and SS. If this can continue it puts the team in such a better place offensively in the years to come.

The worry that many had over Polanco was ridiculous. It was literally based on nothing. I would love to know the original source that everyone aped on that one.

If people are no longer worried about Sano, that is equally ridiculous. He has mishandled a lot of plays and will continue to do so.

As I've said too often by now, I based my worry on personal observation at the back fields at spring training a couple years ago. He was scattering or short-hopping throws as often as making accurate ones. I was not optimistic he could improve by now - my concern was that his arm strength might have maxed out that that point. I am glad to see he has indeed improved - he's making major league plays, not merely routine ones.

 

And conversely, the mistakes Sano makes look correctable with experience, while his ability to come in on a slow roller and fire to first tells me he has all the tools needed to succeed. Improvement comes down to his commitment, which so far this year looks promising. He may not achieve complete reliability in time before his weight becomes the deciding factor some year, so that's the other worry for me.

OK.

But if your eyes were wrong about Polanco, could they also be wrong about Sano?

Polanco is playing well just as some of us thought he would. There was nothing tangible that suggested he could not do the job. Sano is not fielding well, again, just as many of us thought he would. In fact, Sano's OF defense last year is showing up as being marginally better than his 3B defense is this year on the stat sheet -- and we all know the narrative around his OF defense.

I think Taylor Rogers is the biggest beneficiary of their improved D so far based on videos above. Samtana is 2nd

I really don't know what some people expect and/or want from Sano at 3rd base.  Are people expecting gold glove caliber defense from him?  If so, you probably will be waiting awhile.  He has been making the plays he needs to make.  There of course are some plays that would be nice if he made but those hopefully will come in time.  

I have in the meantime gotten my bifocals fixed. It turned out that Polanco was throwing the ball straight and true to the first baseman the whole time.

I could use bifocals myself.

The Twins thought so highly of him as a shortstop that they took him off the position. 

Not sure who started this but it's not true. Polanco was never taken off of SS. You may want to pull up his stats and look. He played SS all through the minors and most of the games he played last year in the majors.

I see this repeated a lot and it's simply bizarre to me. Is there a Twins team in another dimension that everyone else is watching?

My eyes must be completely out of whack.  Sano still looks huge (around the weight he was reported when he got to ST) and his fielding is still looking shaky.  Maybe he set the bar so very low, that any improvement looks massive to some, I don't know.  We already knew he could do well on slow hit balls that he could come in on, which is fine.  His range is still very limited.

Nice article, liked all the little tid bits at the end too.  My comment on the defense is both happy and very surprised.  Less so on Polanco, my guess for him the FO said, once Dozier was staying for the time being, "Polanco you will be playing SS and only SS so lets put in work."  Polanco signed same time as Sano and was supposed to be good defense, but when old FO kept swapping him at 2b it is not easy to get great at either side.  

For those who think the up the middle positions are are pretty much interchangeable, you never have played them.  I think Polanco was finally given the  confidence by the organization that he can play SS and maybe the new FO figured out new way to teach him.

In regards to Sano, I still not a huge fan of him at 3b, but he is at least adequate so far, that is best I can say for him is adequate.

Good for these guys. Nice to see players work hard on their fielding like that. 

I never, ever, ever understood the rush to DH Sano by people in and out of the media, and even in the Twins organization. Doing so his rookie year was understandable - that's where the team had the opening.

But he never really had a chance to play his natural position in the majors before the second half of last year. And yet people simply wrote off his ability to play there. 

I think he's looked good at third. Will he be Nolan Arenado? Probably not. But he's done quite well at the position so far this year. He should get better with time, too. He still hasn't had a full year's worth of major league experience at the position.

Sano will be as good as he wants to be

It's absolutely true, take a look at his minor league numbers. Polanco played 75 games for Rochester last season, not a single inning of which was at shortstop.

And he closed the season with the Twins organization playing 400 innings at shortstop....

I'm sure it occurred to you at some point that the Twins were trying him at 2B because they were planning to shop Dozier, and not because Polanco suddenly could not handle SS. Sometimes the narrative isn't "he sucks" -- there are numerous reasons a team can do things.

Sano will be as good as he wants to be

Truth.

I think the biggest concern over Polanco was and is the arm.  Joe Mauer is a very agile defensive first baseman with quick reflexes and soft hands, traits from his days behind the dish.  Some of those bounced throws will get past a guy like Kennys Vargas or Byung Ho Park if they are over there 120 times a year.