What To Do With Byron Buxton?

Buxton had a terrific night in Rochester. Time to call him up in September.

A good night for Rochester is definitely better than a bad night, but worth noting that Gordon and Vargas had good nights at the plate too.

Buxton really needs a series of good nights down there.

What defense would they have against a claim that it's blatant service time manipulation?

Unless his performance is off the charts, I am not sure that claim would mean much. The reasons for his initial demotion this year would still be largely applicable in September, maybe more so with the continued health struggles.

Buxton is also arb eligible this winter. Maybe we settle at whatever his side submits to stay in his good graces and sidestep a service time grievance?

Call him up when there only enough days left in the season to get that extra year of control. There’s no rule that says call ups have to be on Sept 1 or on the day the minor league season ends.

 

Win win.

 

Twins get the extra year. Buxton gets a handful of AB against MLB pitching.

Okay, this would probably invite a service time grievance.

Seriously, I think it is easier to justify the "falling just short" thing at the start of a player's career, before they have been added to the roster. Harder to hold back vets -- they've met your requirements for a call-up numerous times before, just not now until they are 1 day past a service time threshold?

I admit I don't know the answer with 100% certainty but I'm fairly baseball attentive and I don't recall a ton of reports of clubs getting nailed by grievances filed by the MLBPA.

 

Frankly, the CBA not only allows service time manipulation, it basically encourages it.

 

The Cubs manipulated service time with Kris Bryant

The Astros manipulated service time with George Springer

The Braves manipulated service time with Ronald Acuna

The Yankees manipulated service time with Greyber Torres

 

The list is waaaaaayyyyyy longer than this... "the bad look" is worn by every major league club and it doesn't appear as if the bad look has cost the Cubs or Astros or Yankeees in terms of acquiring players.

All of those guys had service time manipulation at the very beginning of their careers. If you have never promoted a player to your MLB roster before, you can pretty much always find a justification for keeping them in the minors. And the player can't do much about it, because he is not even in the MLBPA yet -- he is not the union's primary concern.

Not so with a player like Buxton. The Twins have promoted him to MLB several times already. To skip out on a promotion after the minor league season ends, the Twins would need a reasonably compelling reason, or they probably could expect Buxton and his union to file a grievance.

I expect the Twins could present such a reason, but if Buxton demonstrates health and good performance at AAA, it will be tougher. And it could be acrimonious.

Didn't JJ Hardy get his time manipulated in a similar fashion when he was with the Brewers? 

 

I don't believe he won that... and honestly, Buxton has zero ground to stand on if the Twins did it. His performance speaks for itself, and a hot few weeks in August isn't going to change that, nor should it. 

JJ Hardy was demoted to AAA in on August 12, 2009. He was having his worst MLB season at the time, and the Brewers promoted BA's #19/#12 overall prospect prospect to directly take his place, Alcides Escobar -- and Escobar did in fact outperform Hardy in terms of OPS the rest of the year. Hardy was also recalled immediately when rosters expanded on Sep. 1, 20 days later.

Of course, the Brewers also didn't keep Hardy around to deal with any potential acrimony -- they traded him for Carlos Gomez basically as soon as the offseason started (Nov. 6). So even if holding down Buxton was easier to justify, it could be a bigger deal down the road for the Twins.

But, at this moment... we are theoretically in contention for 2019. 

 

Not so much in 2018. 

But it's kind of a catch-22.

On one hand, 2018 is indeed lost, so perhaps there's no sense wasting service time in 2018.

But if 2019 is important, you want the player ready on opening day if at all possible, so maybe September 2018 isn't really a "waste" of service time after all.

With an option remaining for 2019, I'm increasingly thinking that it might be a win-win to promote him this September (assuming he's healthy and performing in Rochester, of course). Either it benefits him toward becoming a good MLB hitter again by opening day 2019, in which case we'll all be very thankful given the alternative. Or if it doesn't, he will probably need 29 days in the minors next year anyway.

I don't suppose he is eligible for the AFL

Ha! No. I think 1 year MLB service time is the max for AFL players.

Could do winter ball, but like all players -- do you want him to risk injury in winter ball?

So he would file a grievance and base it entirely on performance from the previous season? That doesn't seem totally frivolous to you? 

 

In order to make such a claim Buxton would need to show that Minnesota's intent with their handling of him was not in good faith, and almost entirely to manipulate his service time. I don't think that's a case you can make. They optioned him originally in early July and there was no angst at that time because it was justified. He then got hurt and (up to this point) hasn't performed well enough to warrant a recall. 

 

I'll grant that if he keeps hitting like he did last night the dynamic changes. But if he's whiffing at a 35% rate and hitting .220 when the Triple-A season wraps up, I don't think the Twins would really need to "defend" their decision not to recall him, especially with other outfielders earning their playing time and Buxton's health in a constantly precarious state. 

 

This report has some really good and comprehensive info on the topic:

Nick, I just scanned that article, and the names listed were Bryant, Gregory Polanco, Singleton, and Springer. Those were all players who had their initial MLB call-ups manipulated. The Buxton situation is different -- this is a player who has already been on the MLB roster, he's already represented by the player's union, and he will have nowhere else to play in September.

I don't think Buxton would win a grievance, but if he performs at AAA and demonstrates health over the next few weeks, it certainly wouldn't be frivolous. And even if the Twins can "win" the grievance process, in some ways they might "lose" just be letting it get to that point.

If we were talking about a pitcher, it would be far easier to justify the "shut down" plan. But I think a position player like Buxton makes that a less convincing case.

Bring him up in September, and offer a team-friendly extension in the off-season. Now is the time to buy low on Buxton.

I don't think Buxton has any incentive to sign anything at this point that doesn't still present significant risk for the Twins.