Brock Beauchamp

Moved to the Twins forum.

Science was used to systematically prove the Earth was round. The evidence was undeniable. As opposed to this metric, which even the creator says is terribly flawed and should not be used as an evaluative tool. 71 runs in half a season. Over a 162 game season, we're talking about a catcher that frames pitches being worth ~145 runs. The Tampa Bay Rays allowed 577 runs in 2012. Once you factor in defense, what's a pitcher worth at that point? 60%? 50%? Lower? There's no way you can tell me with a straight face that the guy who actually stands on the mound and throws the ball is worth somewhere around half of a team's runs. If that was the case, pitchers wouldn't be the most in-demand object of lust in baseball. Again, the idea behind this metric is legitimate. But its actual implementation is completely absurd. PS. I hate Drew Butera. I never wanted him on the roster and think he's a complete waste as a baseball player. I don't care what the stats say about him either way.

Because when you claim outlandish things, people tend to treat them outlandishly. The underlying point has merit; good catchers positively impact a pitching staff. But when you come at us with "a good catcher is worth nearly one run a game compared to the worst", you're going to get laughed out of the room. And for good reason. It's an absurd statement. Would you want the Twins management and share your attitude? My hope us that the study (not mine) will lead them to go through the data. They can take the same approach. They have the capability to look at every pitch that Doumit, Butera and Mauer received with pitch f/x. I hope they did that before signing Doumit and extending him. All of the new game data available in the last several years will lead to new understanding of the impact of defense on winning baseball games. My hope is that the Twins are not behind the curve. As do I; the Twins should be using every ounce of data available to them to make an assessment on a player. The overarching point has merit; the interpretation of that particular data does not. There is simply no way that a good catcher is worth 20% (or, in the case of the Rays, considerably more than 20%) of a team's allowed runs. To even the most casual observer, the metric is horribly flawed... Even the creator of said metric says that it is basically useless at this point. It's not as if the Twins are extraordinarily high on Doumit. Ryan has said that he hopes to see Mauer behind the plate more often in 2013. That doesn't devalue Doumit in any way. He's a poor catcher; nearly everyone admits that. But the point of a backup catcher is not to catch 50 or 60 or 70 games and that's where Doumit shines. He's a backup catcher who should be catching 40 times a year at most so the amount of damage he can do behind the dish is limited. But by having a backup catcher that can OPS at .800, you also have a guy that can pinch hit, play DH, and occasionally even man the outfield (though poorly). The flexibility he offers from a position that is usually a blackhole is outstanding. And nearly every team in MLB, especially AL teams, would love that kind of flexibility.

Because when you claim outlandish things, people tend to treat them outlandishly. The underlying point has merit; good catchers positively impact a pitching staff. But when you come at us with "a good catcher is worth nearly one run a game compared to the worst", you're going to get laughed out of the room. And for good reason. It's an absurd statement.

Think about this for a minute, guys. Why would teams invest so much in pitching? You can take a collection of awful replacement players (basically, the Twins 2012 rotation) and if you can coax them to throwing a well below average 5.00 ERA (not setting the bar very high), to turn that into a league-average rotation, all you'd have to do is go find a catcher who is really good at framing pitches. He'll shave one full run off the ERA and turn that team into a 4.00 ERA rotation overnight. You don't need good pitchers, you only need average to below average hurlers and a good catcher! I mean, really. You have to be ****ing kidding me.

Catchers undoubtedly have an impact on the game. But it's not 20% of runs allowed. Not even close. That's friggin' absurd.

This sounds a lot like the argument from several years ago that Gomez+Span are worth 80 runs a season compared to Span+Young (I believe that was the comparison). It doesn't pass the smell test... Not even close. In this situation, we're saying that Molina is worth ONE RUN A GAME more than Doumit. Stop and think about that for a second. One freakin' run a game... On defense. As a catcher. That doesn't make the slightest bit of sense no matter how you look at it. I'm all for pushing defensive metrics forward and trying to make the best use of them possible but 70+ runs difference between two catchers, neither of which played even half a season behind the plate, is laughable. The average team scores, what, about 5 runs a game? That means, using this metric, that just swapping out Doumit for Molina (over a half season) is worth 20% of your team runs... On defense. Just the catcher. No pitching, no fielding... Just the guy behind the plate. Impossible. Laughable, even. Basically, the argument here is that if you replace Doumit with Molina in 2012, the Twins pitching staff would have gone from 13th in the American League to 9th in the AL, coming pretty close to being a league average pitching staff. By replacing the backup catcher. Not even by replacing the starting catcher. By replacing the backup catcher. And we're not even counting their offensive contributions. The math here makes me shake my head. It's absurd.

Exactly. There is a reason why teams aren't going around giving Juan Pierre multi year deals. Does that mean Denard Span's deal was a mistake? Ben Revere and Denard Span are not even close to the same player. Revere puts the ball on the ground 10% more time while Denard puts it in the air nearly 15% more of the time. Denard has a multi-year track record of taking pitches, working counts, and getting on base. Revere hasn't done that since Beloit. Revere relied on over 30 infield hits to post his meager stats in 2012; Denard has never had more than 24 infield hits and that was during a season where he posted nearly a .400 OBP. Denard had 46 extra-base hits in 2012. Ben Revere had 19. Would you like me to go on?

Jesus, way to twist what I'm saying. I'm saying it's common sense to not extend Revere when the Twins have five more years of control. It's an unnecessary risk because players of his type generally don't age well. How am I unfairly "Chonesing" Revere? He's under team control until his late 20s, just as Figgins was when the Angels let him go. This isn't only about Figgins. This is about Pierre, who dropped off a cliff and never posted a WAR higher than 1.8 after his age 28 season. This is about Vince Coleman, who was a 2 WAR player for several years before dropping off a cliff at age 28, never posting another WAR higher than 1.0. This is about Marquis-freakin-Grissom, who posted a ridiculous 25 WAR in his age 23-29 seasons. After that, he only cleared a 1.0 WAR in three more seasons and posted negative WARs in three more seasons. This is about a list as long as my arm of guys just like Ben Revere; guys who played well through their mid-20s and then hit a brick wall. You can wish and hope all you like but the players of Revere's ilk who play well for an extended period of time are few and far between while the guys who crash and burn after 2-3 seasons are nearly innumerable. Revere's ceiling is low and his risk of failure is high. Every player that relies on speed and BABIP is walking a very fine line of baseball success. Why on Earth would you give a low ceiling, high risk guy an extended contract, especially when you control him for five more years no matter what happens? This is exactly like Nick Blackburn, Part 2. I cannot see why people around here can't see that. It's staring you all straight in the face.

I think Pierre is close to Revere's ceiling. But yeah, not a bad comp at all.

Or Billy Beane. Or Andrew Frieman. But hey, they're just keyboard GMs. I assume you assume they would always, without fail, strictly take the sabremetric argument to determine player value, and I concur it has merit, especially in a small market team with little leeway for making a personnel error. There is also the fans-in-the-seats and more Neilsen rating points for FSN argument, too. Plus you have an an extremely athletic guy at 23 who clearly has a potential for a significantly higher ceiling. No, I'm saying that they use a surplus to their advantage by trading it off, they don't sit on that surplus and wait for it to lose value. As for Revere, I keep hearing "expected improvement", "significantly higher ceiling", etc. etc. What are all of you basing this on? The fact that he hasn't posted an OPS higher than .741 since low A? That he hasn't been a plus hitter since Beloit? Brian freakin' Dozier dominated AA for almost an entire season. Revere couldn't even do that. Beyond trying to snatch hope and dreams from the skies, what is the basis for this faith in Revere? Because his on-field performance has said very different things for 4+ years now. Revere may be an acceptable centerfielder. I'm not saying there's no hope for him as a player. My argument is that there is no evidence to support that he will be a plus player. He has no power. He has no patience at the plate. He hasn't been a good hitter at any level since 2009. Every skill he has as a baseball player is based around the fact that he can run really, really fast. And baseball is historically unkind to those types of players. This isn't sabermetrics. This is observation through 100+ years of the sport. Guys who have one tool tend to fall on their faces, especially if that power is speed. As for Bourn, his upcoming contract is irrelevant. We should be laughing at whoever Boras hoses into paying that guy big money going into his 30s, just as many of us laughed at Seattle when they did the same for Figgins. How'd that work out for the Mariners? What makes anyone think Bourn is going to hold up as he ages? He's the exact kind of player that doesn't hold up as he hits his 30s. Just because some teams are willing to throw bad money around doesn't mean the Twins should follow suit, particularly when all the cards are in their favor (ie. they have five more years of control of Revere). This is Baseball 101 and pure common sense, folks.

Why will his walk rate improve? It was never very good in the minors. He might draw an extra walk or two but there's no reason to think it will ever be significant. And how is extending him not taking a big risk? Was Nick Blackburn not a risk? Are the Twins so flush with cash that they didn't need the $5m paid to Nick in 2012? Seems to me that the $11m wasted on Blackburn in 2012/13 could have been used to pay someone who wouldn't help the team to consecutive "worst pitching staff in the AL" awards.

I'm hesitant to call Revere a 4th outfielder. He's young and could improve significantly. On the other hand, banking $15m on improvement that may not happen sounds pretty foolish to me, especially when the worst case scenario will pay about $20m in arbitration.

Or Billy Beane. Or Andrew Frieman. But hey, they're just keyboard GMs.

You don't shop a guy for a year straight and then take a "meh" offer. I'm confident in saying that was the best deal on the table and I don't think it's a coincidence that it happened in the wake of the Upton signing. I think Ryan had been pushing for Myers and the Nationals were hesitant until they saw a divisional rival pick up the best centerfielder on the free agency market. If Ryan had received better offers, I think we would have seen Span moved last July. After all, every report surrounding Span seemed to mention "the asking price is high". Ryan ended up getting a good return on the guy so it's not as if he threw up his hands and took whatever was offered.

I'd still bat Hicks first. I'm not going to complain about leadoff homeruns while his speed and plate discipline make him a natural for leadoff. At worst, move him to second in the lineup. I think his OBP and speed would be a waste toward the back of the order.

For it. He showed plate discipline and patience that Revere doesn't have. I like speedy guys if they show a continued ability to get on base. Span had that, Revere doesn't. Span also had a small amount of power. Yeah, that too. He had discipline and didn't have to rely on the infield hit to get on base. That's a good indicator of continued success in the league because he was never so utterly dependent on using speed and speed alone to be a valuable player.

For it. He showed plate discipline and patience that Revere doesn't have. I like speedy guys if they show a continued ability to get on base. Span had that, Revere doesn't.

Ding ding ding. It's not as if Revere can leave either way. Worst case scenario, Revere falls in his face and is worthless. The Twins wasted a bunch of money. Best case scenario, Revere turns into a .360 OBP speedster with great defense. Twins still control him through at least 2017. I see a whole lot of risk there and very little reward.

It's an eBook. You should have received a download code several weeks ago. Search your email inbox. If you can't find it, PM me and I'll send you a download link. Sorry for the confusion!

Good god, man.

This is my thinking as well.

Getting back to the projecting part, surplus of what? Surplus of minor league talent? You trade away your MLB players when they gain value in order to make room for wildcards who haven't don't a thing at the MLB level? I guess I would rather see the farm guys who do end up sticking it in the MLB, stay on my team. The Twins have two outfielders in AA who tore the cover off the ball last season. Both are younger than Revere and better hitters. That's a surplus. Why extend Revere when he's not even arb eligible yet and you have two superior players in the minors? It's an unnecessary risk.

Shop him and if no good offers are returned, keep him. Then shop him again at the deadline. The Twins have enough money coming off the books where if they want to go get free agents, they can. Morneau shouldn't be holding them back so there's little reason to dump him unless the offer is good.

Huh. Interesting. I have the feeling I'll be taking you up on that offer, Ben. I have absolutely no issue with creating U of M stuff, I just don't know (or care) enough about college sports (and the U of M) to even start coming up with ideas for apparel. I went to school in California and the only sport I followed at all was baseball (a natural given my interest in baseball and the fact that I went to Cal State Long Beach).