Brock Beauchamp
-
Posts
32,669 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
328
Content Type
Profiles
Minnesota Twins News, Rumors & Analysis
Minnesota Twins Videos
2026 Minnesota Twins Top Prospect Rankings
2022 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks & Signing Bonuses
Minnesota Twins Trade & Free Agent Rumors
Minnesota Twins Fan Guides & Resources
2023 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks & Signing Bonuses
The Minnesota Twins Players Project
2024 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks & Signing Bonuses
2025 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks & Signing Bonuses
2026 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks & Signing Bonuses
Forums
Blogs
Events
Store
Downloads
Gallery
Everything posted by Brock Beauchamp
-
Cave has no business starting against a lefty but here we are again because Buxton can’t stay on the damned field. Jake may be entirely cooked but it’s too early to know for sure. If he is allowed to be in a strict platoon, I still think he does okay. -
It’s easy to forget just how good Donaldson is at third because we so rarely see him there.
-
I got you all beat: I was at the first Rally Monkey game. (for those of you who remember the joke, I'm actually serious, I was there)
-
They play baseball at night? Is that legal?
-
I think this sorts itself out by midseason. If Garver goes back to mashing LHP, keep on keepin’ on. If Garver continues to post mediocre numbers against LHP, we see Baldelli shift to a more neutral platoon of the two players.
-
Polanco worries the hell out of me because his LH swing still looks like garbage. He's constantly flailing and off-balance. Kepler, eh... I don't know. Perhaps people have too high of expectations for him. I think he'll hit okay (a mild disappointment there) and play good defense, making him a decent everyday player. I don't see stardom for him, really, unless he can figure out how to fix that absurd BABIP.
-
I haven't been as worried about Sano as some because: 1. His approach has looked good, he just can't hit the damned ball 2. We've seen this before as Miguel gets ready to start launching moonshots on a regular basis But still, it sure would be nice if he didn't throw away the first 50 PAs of every season/callup. That part is getting a little tiresome.
-
Ooh, I'm interested in this, too. I'd like to take the kids over there some time if it's worth the effort.
-
Yeah, I looked that up a few years ago and noticed there wasn't a difference I could see. Which makes sense, especially in Minnesota... I prefer early season day games simply because it's less effing cold at the stadium and getting out in the sun after a long winter feels pretty good.
-
I'm not sure 5-6 data points during a cold season at the tail end of a pandemic is a great indicator to show reduced interest in a thing.
-
I'll try to dig it up. The movement wasn't drastic but even that graph's movement is significant considering the better the data becomes, the lower the number gets. Losing .015-.020 of BABIP isn't nothing in the grand scope of the game... remember, I'm not blaming the shift for all of baseball's woes and have repeatedly stated it's a small fix for a big problem that should be joined by other changes.
-
I did some of this work last year and can't find the work but mostly, I'm speaking of the infield shift. And from my recollection (again, can't find the work right now) the BABIP on groundballs has consistently gone down for the past 5-6 years and is well down from its historical average.
-
I disagree on the shift, though admit it's a minor point amongst many. More to the general idea, I'm wholly on board with the rest of your post. We're arguing over a tree we disagree upon while agreeing on the forest, it seems.
-
The moment Dobnak signed that contract, the Twins were able to use him as the “whatever” player because they basically control him until the end of the world. I’m sure he’ll make it into the rotation at some point but in the meantime, he gives the roster some flexibility.
-
I believe the Twins altered their first two weeks of play to almost exclusively play day games. It was an intentional decision that was a recent change and not baked into the initial schedule IIRC.
-
I agree in that removing the shift will have a small impact and must come along other, probably more significant, changes. But given the arc of MLB hitting over the past decade and the data that reinforces that continued approach, I think eliminating the shift *will* have a small impact because hitters aren’t going to change that much, if at all. From purely an entertainment standpoint, I find the practice rather indefensible given its inherent drawbacks to promoting action in the game. After all, what prompted this entire conversation was the Twins second baseman standing in the outfield, soaking up a groundball that should have been a hit without even needing to move. It exemplified today’s game. What should have been an action play that resulted in more intrigue with runners on base became a really boring play that made everything less interesting.
-
I’m not as pessimistic as some but even I didn’t see that one coming.
-
Which is why I used to like the shift but now, like so many things, it's an afterthought deployed by almost all teams in baseball. It has reached the saturation point where it's well past "strategy" and into "common practice", which even further limits the reasons for it to continue existing as an interesting aspect of gamesmanship.
-
Except that data continues to reinforce the idea that hitting into a shift is still more productive than trying to hit away from it. So the likely outcome is that we continue to see the same style of baseball, which isn't great to watch*. *the shift is only a small part of this issue but one that's very easily corrected, IMO, because there's nothing inherently interesting or fun about the shift from a spectator perspective while no one says "I wish there were fewer line drives"
-
They lowered the mound and it’s hard to argue that was anything but a resounding success.
-
I complain about the shift only in the context of other issues and also acknowledge it's a small aspect of the movement that has sucked life out of the game. There's simply no reason to keep the shift, really. I used to like it but as it became deployed so often, I realized "but it doesn't have to be this way and there's really nothing interesting or good about it". The NFL and NBA change rules all the time to promote action, there's no reason baseball can't do the same and it's a really small change. Just keep two infielders on each side of second base and each outfielder in one of three zones. It'd hardly be noticeable on a play-by-play basis but once or twice a game, would at least entertain the crowd with a more exciting defensive play/miss. Hitters aren't going to change so choose to change around them in the interest of the spectator, the people who make the game possible.
-
Then you just get seven innings of boring. It doesn't fix the inherent problem with today's game, and that's the removal of most of the exciting action in the game.
-
It will be hard to backtrack game length much; what baseball should focus on doing is bringing the action back into the game. A 3.5 hour game is manageable if balls are flying around, fielders are diving, and runners are moving. Time moves more quickly if the audience is engaged in what's happening. A 3.5 hour game is not manageable if each plate appearance takes two minutes, strikeouts happen 40% of the time, and any balls in play are hit directly into a shift.
-
I have come to despise the shift. It's just one small aspect that makes baseball less fun to watch than it was in the past.
