Brock Beauchamp

Other than Chargois, very little here surprises me. So I guess it's not so much that I dislike the bullpen, it's more that I already resigned myself to this happening.

I find Grossman really interesting. He was a competent outfielder with the Astros. What happened last year that led to a disastrous -19 DRS? Yes, Houston is a much smaller park but that can't be everything... In 1320 LF innings with Houston, Grossman posted a +3 DRS. His RF stats were more limited - 280 innings - but he posted a +6 DRS over there so LF wasn't an aberration. Of course, we're dealing with relatively small sample sizes here, as his LF time in Houston is just shy of 150 full games. Still, that's not a tiny sample size. That's a reasonable baseline from which to start. As for the left side of the infield, a -28 DRS is certainly possible but Sano has been acceptable out there, posting a -3 DRS in 450 innings. That's a small enough sample size to almost be discarded entirely but it gives hope he's not entirely hopeless at third. If Sano plays a full season at that clip, it's around a -9 DRS for a full season. Polanco is the real wildcard here, IMO. HIs -8 DRS at short last season was abysmal, getting there in just 405 innings. My thinking is that Polanco won't be allowed to reach a -20 or lower DRS (which is where that tracks over a full season) and will be replaced by Escobar if things go that far off the rails. Which brings up another question about the left side of the infield... Escobar. DRS has the guy all over the place. It'd be easy to ignore his 2016 due to injury and "general awfulness" but DRS hated him in 2014, too. But in 2015, DRS thought he was an okay player. All were in limited but not unreasonably small innings, between 500-800 per season. Lots of questions about the left side of the infield but -28 seems a bit high to me. I think the defensive terribleness probably caps out around -25 DRS, as Polanco won't hang around at short if he's that bad and even if Escobar fails, I suspect the Twins will go glove-first at short relatively quickly, which will counter some of the awful play that preceded the move. Of course, it's hard to get a read on Sano, which will cause a lot of fluctuation. Is he a -5 DRS guy or a -15 DRS guy? We can assume Polanco will struggle but I'm unsure how badly Sano will struggle. He has an outside chance of being competent out there, particularly after losing weight and getting back into a rhythm at third.

I think we see a reasonable drop but Dozier remains a very good player: .260/.340/.480 32 HR I think the OBP remains steady as pitchers stay away from Dozier and pitch around him a bit more often. All the other numbers drop a bit.

True, but that knife cuts in both directions. If you group LHB against righties, that means you're also bunching RHB against righties. The effect isn't as great (usually, anyway) but you're comprising parts of your lineup either way. And in those later innings, the opposing manager doesn't even have to think about it. You've created the perfect storm for him to exploit with left/right pitching matchups.

Anyway, my general point is that LHB are traditionally horrible against LHP in comparison to their RHP performance. Bunching lefties together in the lineup makes the opposing manager's decisions a lot easier from the sixth inning onward.

That's true about starters but lefties get that advantage either way. It doesn't matter if they're split up or in a row. Yes, bunching them together might impact run-scoring a bit but I was thinking of individual OPS performance, which it won't affect. As for leads/deficits late in games, I suspect the lead/deficit would have to be pretty substantial for a manager not to say "aw hell, three lefties are coming in a row, I'm just going to throw a lefty out there to make sure nothing bad happens". Every pen has one lefty reliever and lots have two of them. Chances are, one of them isn't amazing so why not put him out there to face a trio of LHB?

He's definitely a pull guy (most are nowadays though) but not obnoxiously so. http://www.fangraphs.com/spraycharts.aspx?playerid=8722&position=C&type=battedball In comparison, he's no Brian Dozier, that's for sure. http://www.fangraphs.com/spraycharts.aspx?playerid=9810&position=2B/SS&type=battedball

It's hard to know, really. Jay hasn't been a full-time reliever since 2015. It's possible it takes some time to get back into the flow of relieving. It's possible he drops a pitch and rockets through the system in a matter of months. I suspect we'll have a much better idea what to expect by the end of April once he gets a handful of games under his belt.

I was being very conservative. I suspect the timeline is more like 12 months.

I think the reason it was done now is because Falvey and Levine see something in Jay they don't like as a starter. If you have a player who will take 2-3 years to make the MLB rotation and then struggle in a 4/5 role indefinitely, do you allow him to keep starting or do you put him in the bullpen with the expectation he'll be in Minnesota within 18 months and be a better than average MLB reliever? It's not an easy decision to make and I doubt they made the decision casually... But ultimately, you put your players in the position where they will provide the most team wins going forward. And obviously, Falvey feels Jay can do that from the bullpen, not the rotation. And none of this includes any health considerations you have about Jay as a starter and the number of overall pitches he'll throw if he continues starting.

That's a valid point. And I'm not sure lineup position in regards to handedness has been proven irrelevant. Most conversations I've seen revolve around stuff like whether Dozier should hit second or fifth and whether that matters (ignoring Dozier's home runs, just speaking generally about any player, really). I think handedness matters quite a bit. If you stack three lefties in a row, those lefties are going to suffer in the last third of the game as managers throw lefty relievers at them at least once a game, possibly multiple times a game if possible. If you're a lefty facing LHP 10% more often than a typical lefty bat, your season statistics are going to suffer and the difference won't be negligible. Many LHB hit LHP at a .150-.200 lower OPS. That's not a small difference, that's the kind of thing that can move a player's overall season OPS down .020 or more points.

There's a reason the team finished a whopping 12 games under their expected sequencing. The entire team was awful in run-scoring situations. At one point, the team had something like 17 solo home runs and 3 home runs with runners on base. The real kicker to that stat? With the bases empty, the team had one of the best OBP in baseball at the time (2nd or 3rd IIRC). With runners on base, they were dead last in OBP. That kind of statistical anomaly is incredibly difficult to repeat.

I have a slight preference for Tonkin for the reason you listed but ultimately, Tonkin hasn't brought the goods. At this point, I'm willing to concede superior knowledge and experience to Falvey and Levine regarding his ability to step forward and become a quality reliever.

Hah, you beat me to it.

I agree. How the Cubs and Indians managed their bullpens last postseason was closer to a bullpen ace model than what we've seen in years past. There are problems with the bullpen ace model - largely stemming from players who desire a fixed role, which is understandable - but I think we'll see baseball drift more toward that model in the coming years. Obviously, teams can't manage their bullpen ace like it's the World Series during the entire regular season but there are times and places to use that model throughout the season.

Yeah, baseball has shifted their approach to developing relievers over the years. Your list doesn't include guys like Chapman, who were barely MiLB starters in the first place. Chapman entered MiLB in 2010 and made 13 starts. He never made a start for the Reds, nor did they make an honest attempt to convert him into a starter after that point. He was for all intents and purposes a full-time reliever just four months after playing his first MiLB game for the Reds.

Castro is a .750 OPS player against RHP and a .500-.530 guy against LHP. Castro took 26% of his plate appearances against LHP in 2016. I did a quick spot check and the league average for LHB against LHP is just a tick over 30%. So Castro was already seeing his plate appearances against LHP minimized by the Astros. There may be a bit more wiggle room in there as you push those plate appearances toward 20% but I'm skeptical the Twins, even with aggressive platooning, will be able to get it below that number. So, maybe there's room to improve there but not a lot. I think Seth's .675 OPS prediction is pretty fair. Maybe the Twins could try to put that toward .690 but large gains will not be found through platooning.

Keep Tonkin, keep Wimmers, keep Haley, fire them all... these are not the decisions that rile me up. None of those players are obviously superior to the others. I'll rely on Falvey and Levine to know more about baseball than me and make the correct decision.

Yeah, that's why I put the Sox at 70-74 wins and the Twins at 71-75. I give the Twins a microscopic advantage.

Willingham was a gamble, one that didn't pan out for the Twins. In retrospect, they should have traded him for whatever they could get (and many here lobbied that position). But had Willingham blasted another 15+ homers at the deadline the following season, his value would have been higher. I wish they would have traded him but it's not the most egregious error the front office made during that time span. That's all I'm saying, really.

Yeah. Break down the numbers and it gets pretty ugly. 150 plate appearances is 22% of Dozier's 2016 plate appearances. Brian Dozier hit 42 home runs last season. 22% of 42 is nine home runs. Assuming the average player down the order goes to the plate with men on base 40% of the time, that means at least four of his home runs scored a single run when, had he hit further down the order, they would have scored multiple runs. Assuming the average men on base number is 1.5, that is, at minimum, six runs the Twins left on the table last season. Six runs is close to one team win.

I think this is spot-on. Could the Twins have gotten something for Willingham? Sure. But what was on the table? When Willingham peaked, there were loads of questions about his expected performance going forward. On top of that, look at what has happened to bat-first players over the past half decade. They're signing deals that are far lower than what they received in previous years. The game has moved away from valuing them at the level they were once valued. Look at Edwin Encarnacion. The guy gets MVP votes almost every season, routinely posts a .900 OPS, and signed a 3/$60m deal this offseason. Kendrys Morales signed for just 3/$33m and the Blue Jays probably have some buyer's remorse over that deal after seeing what Encarnacion fetched on the market.

That looks about right to me, though I'd shift Detroit down a notch. But I do that every year and I'm always wrong about it so there you go. Cleveland: 90+ wins Detroit: 78-82 wins Kansas City: 76-80 wins Minnesota: 71-75 wins Chicago: 70-74 wins This division is bad but not terrible. I expect them to take a fair amount of their licks from the rest of the league, driving the entire division's win total (non-Cleveland edition) down a bit.

I'd run with Polanco but that's just my opinion. I can see a few reasons to go with Mauer or Grossman or whatever. But I think it's folly to put a 40 home run guy in the leadoff spot where he's guaranteed to spend 20-25% of his plate appearances with no one on base. Given an equal distribution of home runs, that means Dozier will hit 3-4 home runs without anyone on base where, if he was hitting further down the lineup, men would be on base in those situations. That one move alone will cost the team between three and ten runs over the course of a season.* *predicated on the idea Dozier is a 40 homer guy, shift the numbers accordingly if you think he's a 30 homer guy

The White Sox definitely had a fire sale but that doesn't mean they traded every player of value on their roster. Both ideas can exist simultaneously. And besides, it's bloody hard to move ten guys in a single offseason. The White Sox moved their most valuable assets and got a crapton in return for them. I suspect there's a better than even chance we'll see some of those other guys go on the block in the next eleven months.