Brock Beauchamp

Many have been critical of the front office's first round picks and for good reason: they have yet to draft a player that rushes through the system and succeeds at the highest level. Early this season, it appeared Aaron Sabato was yet another name that was going to end up on the disappointment list. Thankfully, the first baseman has turned it around in the past month, slugging as was expected of him against lower minors competition... it makes sense that he scuffled early, given that he was drafted over a year ago but didn't play a MiLB game until May of this year. It's against lower minors competition but the extra good news is that he has continued to rake against higher competition after being promoted to Cedar Rapids in late August. Here are his season splits: 2021 Player Batting Splits Split G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB Total 105 459 357 67 71 18 0 19 57 1 0 91 149 .199 .370 .409 .779 146 2 8 0 3 1 May 23 107 80 10 11 4 0 2 7 0 0 24 40 .138 .355 .263 .618 21 1 3 0 0 0 June 25 107 82 19 19 5 0 1 10 0 0 24 27 .232 .411 .329 .740 27 1 1 0 0 0 July 22 94 76 9 14 4 0 1 9 1 0 18 30 .184 .340 .276 .617 21 0 0 0 0 0 August 20 85 69 15 15 5 0 9 19 0 0 11 31 .217 .353 .681 1.034 47 0 4 0 1 0 September 15 66 50 14 12 0 0 6 12 0 0 14 21 .240 .394 .600 .994 30 0 0 0 2 1 Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table Generated 9/19/2021.

This game wasn’t nearly as bad as I expected it to be after the first inning. But damn that ninth inning was pathetic. Kepler needs to spend the off-season taking thousands of pitches and bunting them to third.

It wouldn't, though. Baseball goes to commercial between innings and at pitching changes. The same number of commercials would air per game.

Next time you’re frustrated by this team, remember this: the Orioles are 18-51 against division opponents.

Tim Laudner is a really bad commentator. I'm pretty sure he just referred to Farrell as "John" multiple times.

Donaldson has been quite good. Garver has been extremely good, but injured. Sano has been acceptable.

I feel this way about very few players but it happens from time to time. It really stung to see Johan traded. I'll be quite angry if Buxton is traded.

Baseball-Ref puts Simmons in the top five... of what? I'm not trying to be a prat, I'm legitimately curious what you're looking at. And don't ascribe ill intent to other users simply because they prefer other metrics or use metrics you're not familiar with. We all have the option of learning new things. Ten years ago, I was dead-set against fWAR for pitchers, now I slightly lean toward it over rWAR. Others will argue vehemently for the opposite and I'm not sure they're wrong. There's no perfect answer here but being a jerk about it is almost always the wrong solution.

Two clocks are rather unnecessary. Give control to the pitcher and make the batter be ready when he throws. It's not as if a pitcher can toe the rubber and get the ball to the plate in a split second. If the batter is in the box, he can follow what the pitcher is doing, be prepared, and react accordingly. I'd be fine with adding the pitch clock only when the bases are empty but ultimately, it may need to be universal, lest the pitcher start reeling and then slow the game to a crawl as he tries to regain his composure.

I lean toward pitching but if pitching isn’t available or the market is absurd, SS is the obvious hole to fill. Lots of very good candidates, many arguments to be made for signing any of them. Except Simmons. If Simmons is on this roster in 2022, I will start flipping tables.

Okay, this is pretty fun. Here's my takeaway: 1. Front Office: 30% - They chose the wrong horses at nearly every opportunity. Outside of Ober, they failed to protect good players (including Miranda, they were simply lucky no one selected him). They paid all the wrong people. If there was a decision to be made, they made the wrong one (outside of Cruz). 2. Players: 30% - They're the ones who took the field. No one coached Happ into becoming a crap pitcher. No one told Sano to go into his typical early season funk, except moreso this time. No one told basically the entire roster to underperform for two full months. Out of the lists above this one, I find it odd and a little amusing how reluctant anyone is to assign proper blame to the millionaires who go out there and win actual baseball games. 3. Injuries: 20% - On top of many bad decisions, basically everyone, especially the minor leaguers, decided to be injured... basically for the entirety of the first three months of the season. Even guys who should have helped stop the bleeding - like Maeda - only contributed more to it because they faced constant injuries and the resulting bad performance. There was no relenting with this team. The bad decisions were the front office's fault but no quarter was to be found anywhere to cover their mistakes. 4. Colome & Simmons: 15% - It's easy to forget that this team started 5-2 and could easily have started 7-0. It's hard to know how the Twins would have recovered from other players' underperformance had these two meddling kids not done everything in their power to tank the entire team permanently. Tag-teaming on top of the bad front office decisions, these two players, respectively, tried to break the franchise record for negative WPA and tried to knock out half the (already depleted) roster with Covid, all within the first three weeks of the season. Without either or preferably both of them, we may have seen a very different baseball season in 2021. 5. Manager & Coaches: 5% - I don't know where to put them, frankly. Between all of them, maybe they're the biggest problem... but I'm not talking about Rocco here, I'm talking about the coaches. I simply don't see how Rocco has a significant influence on play unless we're talking clubhouse demeanor... but this was a veteran team full of players used to winning. Had there been an easy fix to this mess, any number of veterans could have stepped forward into a leadership role and righted the ship. As for the on-field underperformance, I have no clue. It's hard to judge coaches but it's pretty obvious they didn't do a great job. This number could just as easily be 25%, primarily on the pitching and hitting coaches, as the 5% I gave it.

I actually agree under most circumstances but the pitching staff is going to be so underwhelming that the biggest, easy gains will likely be found there. It's not hard to find large improvement when you're likely fielding players below replacement level.

Yeah, I was actually surprised his OBP was that high.

Almost all LHB are bad against LHP. Even all-time great talents like Joe Mauer have splits like this: Platoon Splits I Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB ROE BAbip tOPS+ vs RHP 1669 5449 4699 740 1477 332 26 110 625 38 13 702 659 .314 .401 .466 .868 2191 144 6 4 38 131 41 .345 110 vs LHP 1153 2511 2231 278 646 96 4 33 298 14 6 237 375 .290 .360 .381 .740 849 64 19 2 22 14 23 .332 80 Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table Generated 9/17/2021.

Glad to hear it's not another Covid incident and has a legitimate, good reason to go onto the restricted list (not that I care whether Simmons plays at this point but I don't wish him ill or anything).

He's bad against LHP, which is why he moves around the lineup card. Platoon Splits I Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB ROE BAbip tOPS+ vs RHP 212 679 619 99 206 39 5 6 59 4 4 50 55 .333 .381 .441 .822 273 8 3 0 7 2 5 .354 111 vs LHP 126 234 198 22 49 6 1 0 19 0 0 34 28 .247 .355 .288 .643 57 3 0 0 2 1 0 .285 66 Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table Generated 9/17/2021.

Only Murders in the Building is very good (Hulu).

I feel similarly about Tatis. So much fun to watch and it’s a bummer his infield play has been so limited this season. As a whole, the Jays are one of the most fun teams in baseball.

I've been advocating for a pitch clock for about a decade now and why we don't have a hard pitch clock in MLB continues to baffle me. It fixes a bunch of problems in one fell swoop: pace of play, overall game length, max-effort pitching, increased action, and probably other stuff I'm not thinking of in the moment. Make it happen already, MLB. Stop sitting around, hoping that the game is going to magically fix itself, you ineffectual buffoons. If you don't subscribe to The Athletic, you should probably do so but here's a game length chart from the article. Yikes. 1981 2:33 1991 2:48 2001 2:58 2011 2:51 2021 3:09 https://theathletic.com/2829518/2021/09/17/can-this-minor-league-pitch-clock-solve-all-of-mlbs-problems/?source=user_shared_article&fbclid=IwAR0RwcQsa-gGLdQ75UcduGHVJn09oZ_up1rWr3Bb9LMKfIfuvp2ojTED0SE

Whoa, a game thread before 11am!

As much as I'd love to see the Twins field a competent shortstop for once, I really hope they don't spend money on a long term shortstop. They really need to invest that money in starting pitching and 1-2 good bullpen pieces.

Good point, I hadn't checked in on him lately. If he finishes strong, he's likely on the 2022 roster. I knew he was playing better but didn't realize he was performing to the tune of a .900 OPS. In that case, I hope all of Cave, Refsnyder, and Garlick are gone and the Twins go find a stop-gap backup centerfielder until Celestino is ready. They can't continue to backfill a roster with corner players.

I’m not so sure about that. I’d put Rooker at 50/50 right now. While this front office drafted him, I think they also realize they can’t continue to assemble a roster full of no-position players and succeed. I don’t know which players they’ll keep and which they’ll jettison but Rooker is certainly on the list of candidates.

You mean the guy with a 4.08 ERA and a 5.18 FIP since joining the Cardinals?* Yeah, great. Whooooooo World Series, baby. *Happ's FIP in Minnesota was 5.41, for the record