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jkcarew

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Everything posted by jkcarew

  1. jkcarew
    Noteworthy that bilateral leg weakness didn't make the board at 100-1.
  2. jkcarew
    Boy...an absolute miserable year in the state of Florida for baseball. Those three weeks in March make up for it in terms of revenue, I'm sure. But it's an awful place to be trying to get games and innings in to develop players. Or was it just worse than normal this year?
  3. jkcarew
    Rare is the experienced major leaguer who consistently performs much better or much worse in leverage situations than they do in all other situations. Schoop is no exception...most of his leverage numbers are right at his career overall OPS of 745...some are moderately below that. Of coarse, I'd much rather have Cruz up in a leverage spot than Schoop...but that's because Cruz is a better hitter than Schoop and always has been. We get carrier away with in-season leverage numbers, and the samples are just too small. Of course, it seems like whoever is in a slump is the guy who keeps coming up in leverage situations.
  4. jkcarew
    You are aware he was drafted 13th overall, right? Earlier than the most optimistic service you cite. He’s a high ceiling low floor guy who arrived late on the national scene. And there’s more projection than even for a typically high-schooler based on his late birth date. Did I say he was a horrendous reach? Maybe better to say he was a high-risk pick, picked when lower-risk options are typically still available.
  5. jkcarew
    Scouting consensus was that Cavaco was extremely raw and a reach at #13. Score one for the consensus. IMO, not all first-round draft picks should immediately be considered highly-ranked prospects. Cavaco is the poster-child for this argument.
  6. jkcarew
    Also illustrates how the Twins...to the extent you can call this offense 'vulnerable'...are vulnerable to tough right-handed pitching. Given this lineup, you'd wish that Kepler and Rosario, in the front/middle of the lineup, crushed right-handed pitching...they really don't. Their splits this year (870 for Kepler and 824 for Rosario) are good, not great...and, actually better than their career numbers against righties. It hasn't hurt much given how many of the right-handed bats have handled most right-handers. The challenge comes when facing a right-hander that doesn't fit into the category of 'most'.
  7. jkcarew
    Depressing to think how good the White Sox should be (or at least can be) in the very near future. They have good very young players all over the place...and will have more (Kopech) next year. The easier opportunity to pitch around Abreu was last week...when they didn't do it. Much harder to pitch around him with Moncada in the lineup. Moncada was expected to be legit...and he is. Already arguably a better hitter than Abreu.
  8. jkcarew
    Almost as entertaining as if we had a Cody (or Kody) Schieferdecker? What are the chances?
  9. jkcarew
    I'd love to know how much he's injured right now. How much (if any) is the ankle inhibiting him at the plate or in the field. It seems it has been to my eyes. But maybe not...maybe this is as good as Eddie's going to get. Despite some very hot streaks...his offensive performance over the last three years has actually been very consistent...between 803 and 836 OPS. And he's trending back to being that guy that is absolutely unwilling to take pitches out of the zone....less than 4% walk rate this season...and a 304 OBP over the last calendar year (last 365 days). I'd guess the Twins signing priorities would be Berrios, Buxton, Sano, Rosario...in order. But should it be? I don't think it's easy or obvious that that is the order of future value that each will end up achieving. It's just that organizational starting pitching is so thin, you probably have to over-spend for Berrios. And corner outfield is one of the only positions where the Twins seem to have prospect options that are near major-league ready. Buxton and Sano still seem to have unanswered questions (availability/consistency)...and Rosario could end up being the better over-all player. Still, I'd go with the priorities above (maybe flipping Sano and Buxton)...and consider parting ways with Rosario based on other needs and near-term priorities for money.
  10. jkcarew
    Which matches the eye test, and makes sense. Lineups that hit a lot of singles get lots of fastballs, since a hit often isn't any (or much) worse than a walk. That's not the Twins. Lineups like the Twins, that hit a ton of home runs get lots of breaking balls...and fastballs on the edge or outside the zone. Twins power hitters...especially since Sano seems to have made his adjustments...aren't getting challenged with fastballs in the zone frequently, at least by the 80%+ of pitchers that don't have extraordinary fastballs. It's amazing how many 2-1 and 3-1 pitches the Twins get that are still not fastballs.
  11. jkcarew
    “Make sure not to pass on the message but opposing pitchers and coaching staffs must not have caught on to Minnesota’s fastball tendencies. Through this weekend’s games, the Twins have seen fastballs in 26.4% of their at-bats while the MLB average is 22.0%. Mitch Garver (34.2 FB%), Miguel Sano (32.6%), Jason Castro (31.1%), Eddie Rosario (30.4%) and Max Kepler (30.1%) are all seeing fastballs at least a third of the time. The Twins also have five other regular players with a FB% above the league average.” No. You are quoting batted ball statistics, not pitches faced. The Twins have a 26.4% FLY BALL rate...vs league average of 22%.
  12. jkcarew
    Not sure I remember many names from the list of bad relievers that became good starters. I would consider that more a hope than a plan. Meanwhile, the Twins should be as patient as they can with Romero, but think he needs to figure out how to get guys out from the bullpen before I’d be pushing him back to a starting role.
  13. jkcarew
    Arraez is a second baseman or (maybe) a super utility guy. Even as good as he’s been, he’s one week of bad BABiP from being a sub-800 OPS guy. (Current BABiP is in Carew territory...and as good or better than most of Gwynn’s seasons...this is as good as we could reasonably expect over large samples.) The bat plays much better at second (or in a super utility role). His OBP is a great fit for the current lineup which is full of guys who can SLG...future Twins lineups? We’ll see. Also, why would you say Cave has a smaller sample size than Arraez? For this year, I guess...but why wouldn’t last year mean anything? Cave has a larger sample. Cave is OPS+’ing 115 for his career (112 last season) across more than 450 plate appearances. This is a good talker for us, but too many things need to play out including health and performances and the profile of the opposition’s pitching. I expect the staff won’t spend too much thought on this until shortly before those decisions need to be made.
  14. jkcarew
    Compare Thome’s MVP voting to Killebrew’s.
  15. jkcarew
    Not sure of the Point. Killebrew has more career WAR than Puckett as well...and again, considerably better peak years.
  16. jkcarew
    Killebrew’s 143 means he was 43% over league average...Puckett’s 124 means he was 24% over league average. Not that close offensively. The peak years are even more in Killebrew’s favor...Kirby never had the ‘decline years’ Killebrew had at the end...due to the abrupt end of Kirby’s career. Team accomplishment wise, Killebrew played the vast majority of his career where only the best team record-wise got a crack at the WS (no divisional play). I agree Kirby was the much more valuable defensive player and has the rings. Kirby might be my all-time favorite Twin..could raise the level of the team with his play and with his personality. But, I think Killebrew was more valuable in his prime...and was maybe the most nice, humble, and kind star to ever play for the franchise. I saw them both play. And I’ll never forget either.
  17. jkcarew
    This. Outfield especially...aren’t even directionally correct/consistent. Makes sense when who makes the putout (center fielder or corner fielder) is often arbitrary...and each player defends a different area and geometry based on ballpark (among many other problems with current data). Meanwhile, infield metrics will get less reliable before they get more, given all the variances in how/when teams shift. Some day we will laugh at the era where we had defensive metrics that only considered results, without accounting for time, distance, two and three dimensional coordinates, etc...and without accounting for impacts of alignments and adjacent defenders. Meanwhile, I immediately back out the defensive component to a player’s WAR when considering any argument for/against that player based on WAR. Or simply go to his wRC+, and let my eyeballs and common sense add/subtract if there is anything on the defensive side to warrant it.
  18. jkcarew
    White Sox are not awful. They're basically as close to the Twins in the standings as they are Detroit....and their run differential is 100+ runs better than Detroit (and some other 'really awful' teams). If they win tody, they will have 30 wins against +500 teams. That's about as many as anyone not named the Yankees has in the AL. The Monday game was the regrettable game...a loss to this team on a day Giolito starts can't be considered particularly 'unlikely' even for a good team.
  19. jkcarew
    To be fair, he was still a very good player in 1901.
  20. jkcarew
    Good points regarding what you would use him for (theoretically) in the post-season. Still, no thanks...no thanks to the contract, no thanks to the roster spot. No thanks.
  21. jkcarew
    Cave career OPS+...106 (92 this year); Hamilton 68 (and 46). There is no amount of fly balls that can be hit that Cave can't get to to make up for that. And Wade has already started his rehab assignment in Cedar Rapids.
  22. jkcarew
    Back to Hamilton... No. I'm not adding a guy to the 40-man that I'll literally never bat. And I'd never put him in the starting lineup. Cave's a better all-around player. Lamonte Wade is probably a better overall player. (To limit myself to players already on the 40-man.) And again, even this year, not adding a guy to the 40-man that I'd use solely to pinch run or put in center for one or two innings. Even in center field, elite speed is a nice-to-have...not a have-to-have. What you have to have is the ability to occasionally not make an out or hit the ball over the fence. Hamilton can't do either. Hard pass.
  23. jkcarew
    Or it could have something to do with how they think/hope Alcala's stuff translates to a reliever role. Alcala had a 3.96 FIP and 3.71 xFIP at Pensacola to Graterol's 3.22 and 3.52. They had about the same K%, and Alcala posted his numbers across twice as many innings as Graterol. Also, Alcala is 24 years old now. IMO, if they're going to convert him, they should be aggressive about it, regardless of how he was acquired. Doesn't mean they have to call him up if the results are not there.
  24. jkcarew
    Thought I had heard that velocity was up during the broadcast. First couple of innings. Maybe just anecdotal for a small number of pitches and not supported by the body of the data for that outing? If so, it's just another reason to seriously consider shutting him down for a start or two now....not waiting.
  25. jkcarew
    It's a good question. I wonder if his improved velocity (results notwithstanding) in the recent start against Texas convince them to forge ahead for now with the idea of resting him later if/when the opportunity arises or if the results continue to be poor? If he were to make all his remaining scheduled starts, his total innings workload wouldn't come in that much beyond the 192+ he had last year. And his next scheduled start lines up against Boyd in the opener of the Detroit series, unfortunately...kind of makes it less 'ideal' to start a rookie against Boyd. I would guess they are actively evaluating him and these options.
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