Minnesota’s Base Running Resurgence

Very interesting article on a subject that deserves more attention. Being from the o ld school of fans, I'm still trying to get my head around all these new stats, or sabermetrics, or whatever they are being called these days. BsR is a new one for me! But yeah, these sort of running skills are crucial in creating runs, or the opportunity to score more of them. Great to see the Twins scoring high in this area.

Probably THE single most underrated part of a baseball offense is baserunning and not just stealing bases. Taking that extra base is huge...turn a single into a double, a double to a triple, going 1st to 3rd.  To me, that was the one of the funnest things to watch with this team in 2017.  With the exception of Sano and Castro, the regular lineup runs very well for each respective position...even Mauer at 34 runs better than a lot of 1B.  Looking forward to more improvement in 2018.

They say speed doesn't go in a slump, so it's nice to see the Twins with all the speed options. I would like to see bunting, particularly drag bunting, as maybe a larger part of our arsenal for next year. If not for the excitement it can generate, then for the fact that it forces some of our free swingers to see the ball a little longer.

One of the sweetest sights in baseball is watching Buxton hit a gapper or chasing one down. We have a great combination of speed and power which made watching the Twins so much fun again. Let's hope we utilize that speed with more SB's in '18.

I'm old school, but with a dash of respect for today's metrics. I think speed and baserunning are underrated, but stolen bases are overrated, especially if the caught stealing percentage is high. The ability to take the extra base is often huge, but also is unnoticed. Molitor was the absolute master of baserunning when he was a player, both taking extra bases and stealing them with a minimum of outs and maximum reward.

 

I also think the numbers provided by Fangraphs might be arbitrary or not useful. BB Ref, for example made Dozier a negative base runner and had Adrianza at only a +1, both fared much better in Fangraphs. Buxton was +9 in BB Ref, so if you're really good it will show no matter what the metric.

I feel the same way. I'm also of the opinion that Molitor was an exceptional baserunner based much more on his brains and instincts than on his foot speed. But yeah, I've long thought that base running is undervalued by most everyone but the managers and coaches. It's aleays been a source of curiosity that so often, when a manager gets asked about a player's skills, they mention things that the average fan wouldn't, with "knowing how to run the bases" a frequent observation.

As a whole, I think the Twins have been pretty good base runners for a while. They may or may not be the best at it, but they can apply enough pressure on the opposing team to where they have to take Twins baserunners seriously.

Mauer's seems like a fine baserunner, but he doesn't steal bases and grounds into plenty of DPs, so I'm not surprised to see him with a bottom 5 sort of number...but looking at some of the other 1Bs around the league Fan Graphs basically just thinks he stinks at it. That's a surprise; I figured his issues would be around the no SBs and the GIDPs, but he's not that different from a number of other guys at his position in that regard. 

Not a surprise to see Buxton rank so well; he's electric out there and it's a delight to watch. I almost don't want him slugging HRs because it's so fun to see him on the bases. (swear to god, you could see fear in the eyes of LFs last year when he'd flip a single even a little bit towards the line knowing that he was fast enough to turn a routine single into a double if they didn't hustle after the ball)

Probably THE single most underrated part of a baseball offense is baserunning and not just stealing bases. Taking that extra base is huge...turn a single into a double, a double to a triple, going 1st to 3rd.  To me, that was the one of the funnest things to watch with this team in 2017.  With the exception of Sano and Castro, the regular lineup runs very well for each respective position...even Mauer at 34 runs better than a lot of 1B.  Looking forward to more improvement in 2018.

Turning a single into a double won us a world series...Dan Gladden takes second on a blooper and a bounce.

I have to give some credit to Molly as his baserunning genius must have quite an influence on his club.

Conspicuous by his abscence of the list of good Twins baserunners: Eddie Rosario. Which kinda confirms what our eyes were telling us last season. He’s plenty fast, decision making is poor, and that’s being kind.

As long as Buck steals second and third every time he's on base, I'm happy.

I dream of Buxton turning into Ricky Henderson... He's got the speed but he hasn't learned yet to take FULL advantage of it after a single... Dude should have a lot of SB's in his future. So excited to have him on our team.