bean5302
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Everything posted by bean5302
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Kirilloff is even further down the depth chart now than Trevor Larnach was coming into the season. It'll take a minor miracle for him to see another season in a Twins uniform. He's had 900 plate appearances across 4 years in the majors where he's been consistently below average at the plate, shielded from LHP, and a butcher at every defensive position he's played. To top that off, he's coming up on arb2 status. This time, there's not even a mysterious injury to provide an excuse. He's a highly likely trade/non-tender guy, and if traded, it'd be for a PTBNL or something like that. Kirilloff is emergency depth for a different MLB team.
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The Phantom IL is not going to happen with Thielbar. This is especially the case with a front office who'd be easy to suspend considering their Lame Duck contract status situation. Aside from that, AAA is not a magical cure all or fountain of youth which fixes career twilight pitchers like Jay Jackson and Caleb Thielbar.
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- pablo lopez
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Thielbar looks cooked to me. He just doesn't have it, and he hasn't had it for a while. Looking at reliever ERA isn't great because the inherited base runners allowed to score isn't part of their ERA. Thielbar's FIP looks real rough for over a month now, and it was only serviceable before that. His xFIP has been bad all year. Rocking a 2.04 WHIP on the season after today due to hitters , that puts him as the 3rd worst in all MLB among relievers with 15+ innings. He's in the bottom 25-35% for a whole host of numbers on BaseballSavant as well so it's not like it's all luck, either.
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- pablo lopez
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Offseason, midseason, beginning of season. It doesn't matter. Same exact argument. When Kirilloff wasn't able to swing the bat effectively, he got put on the IL, he didn't get pushed to struggle through injury like top players because Kirilloff provided no on the field value. Kirilloff has been essentially the same hitter every season with supposed different injuries (barring his unsustainable BABIP 2023). It's not a coincidence. Just like it's not a coincidence every time he puts on a Saints uniform he's not hurt anymore and he hits well, only to be "hurt" by putting on a Twins' uniform. Let's be realistic here. Kirilloff's biggest injury has been MLB pitching. Kirilloff is now in the minors because he earned another demotion after his bat still didn't play after 900 plate appearances in MLB. He's arb2 and out of options next year. Guess who gets non-tendered in November, just like his older version clone, Nomar Mazara did?
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Did Jay Jackson fix his missing velocity, too? 3 games to fix a completely flat slider in St. Paul. I just don't see how that wasn't something the Twins could have addressed during normal bullpens.
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- jay jackson
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St. Paul is the Place for Jay Jackson’s Resurgence
bean5302 replied to Theodore Tollefson's topic in Twins Minor League Talk
Sometimes the moves this front office makes are just perplexing. -
2022, 2023, 2024, Career xFIP FTO = 4.27, 4.31, 4.43, 4.32 STO = 3.05, 3.40, 4.62, 3.57 TTO = 6.69, 5.32, 2.76, 5.12 The problem with him being "terrible" in the TTO is guys allowed to pitch TTO are given the quick hook when things don't go well. Rather than being given the opportunity to pitch out of a jam or pitch after allowing a home run, the manager calls in a reliever. Those runs allowed by the starter (or the reliever who allows inherited runners to score) get hung on the pitcher's TTO ERA and FIP, without the ability to offset them by continuing to pitch under the assumption the pitcher is no longer going to be effective moving forward. This artificially inflates ERA/FIP and perpetuates the TTO myth. In general, the difference between FTO -> STO is worse than STO -> TTO when I've looked at MLB as a whole for larger sample sizes, and the jump from STO -> TTO has sometimes been negligible in xFIP. The question, though, is not whether or not the pitcher is worse than they started the game, it's whether or not the starter is worse than a reliever you'd replace them with or how the replacement impacts the bullpen's readiness.
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- louis varland
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Does it really matter? Correa is a very good baseball player. He's the #9 SS in baseball during the time he's been with the Twins, including last year's disappointing campaign from him. IMHO, he's a reliable All Star caliber player who can be expected to produce about 4-5 WAR. He's not the greatest shortstop in baseball, and he doesn't need to be the greatest because he's not paid like the greatest. While Royce Lewis has become the new face of the franchise, Carlos Correa is the veteran leader and cornerstone at this point, and there is a lot of value in that. I think he's almost universally liked. His leadership and instincts were on full display last year in the playoffs, and his work was absolutely key in the Twins advancing. If we were to calculate Correa's value based on different methods. Traditional $8MM / WAR, keeping in mind this cost is decreasing right now as teams are paying less per free agent WAR than they used to, but I don't expect the trend to continue as MLB revenues/payrolls are inflating so I'll hold it right at $8MM per WAR, with 4.00% inflation assumed for MLB salaries. For this year, I assumed he'd play in 137 games (88 of 95 remaining games) and multiplied 137 / 49 by his current fWAR. Correa: 2022 a27, 4.6 fWAR = $37MM vs. $35MM paid. 2023 a28, 1.9 fWAR = $15MM vs. $36MM paid. 2024 a29, 5.3 fWAR = $42.4MM vs. $36MM paid. 2025 a30, 4.5 fWAR = $36MM vs. $36MM ($33MM w/inflation) paid. 2026 a31, 4.0 fWAR = $32MM vs. $31.5MM ($28MM w/inflation) paid. 2027 a32, 3.5 fWAR = $28MM vs. $30.5MM ($26MM w/inflation) paid. 2028 a33, 3.0 fWAR = $24MM vs. $30.0MM ($25MM w/inflation) paid. ----------------------------------------------------------------- guarantee ends, moves to 3B? 2029 a34, 2.0 fWAR = $16MM vs. $25MM ($20MM w/inflation) paid. 2030 a35, 2.0 fWAR = $16MM vs. $20MM ($15MM w/inflation) paid. 2031 a36, 1.5 fWAR = $12MM vs. $15MM ($11MM w/inflation) paid. 2032 a 37, 0.5 fWAR = $4MM vs. $10MM ($7MM w/inflation) paid. Basically, Correa's contract is pretty reasonable. Even considering his performance on the field should be expected to decline as he ages and moves off SS, his salary is probably pretty commiserate with reasonable production expectations, and if he does wind up suffering a significant injury or playing time, beyond age 33, the Twins aren't on the hook for anything.
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- carlos correa
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Based on Varland's post game comments, he sounded very happy to get 5 good innings pitched rather than like a pitcher who had any confidence it would continue. I don't care about TTO. It's a myth reinforced by a methodology. xFIP rises more on STO than TTO. That said, if the desire was to give some rest to the pitching staff like Baldelli talked about, you absolutely send Varland out there for the 6th inning so your guys can actually get rest. I'm going to go even further on this. Varland was at 65 pitches. Why do players get better against a pitcher TTO? The argument is players see "x" number of pitches and they figure a guy out. Except Varland had only thrown 65 pitches so the opposing batters hadn't seen that many pitches to figure Varland out as thoroughly, right? TTO is such a garbage theory.
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- louis varland
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Seriously, if you were one of the fans who believed Lopez was an acceptable ace, yes, it's time to be very concerned. He's not an ace. He's not even a great #2. Throughout his career, he's typically run an ERA significantly higher than his FIP, like our old friend Ricky Nolasco. When you see a pattern year in and out, there's a good chance the results are not luck oriented, they're part of a player's profile. Lopez has struggled quite a bit with the gopher ball this year, but even if he corrects it, and pitches lights out to get back to where you'd expect he'd be at a normal luck level, he'll run a 3.85ish ERA this year. He's a solid playoff rotation arm, but he can't be counted on to lead a playoff caliber rotation.
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Fair enough. Re-reading that seemed awfully harsh on my part. It's definitely reduced his value already, though. If Jenkins doesn't return to form before the All Star break, it will have a very measurable impact. Probably 30-40% of his trade value.
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- walker jenkins
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Players play with injuries that require offseason surgery to address all the time. Players play hurt all the time. Aches and pains are normal. Kirk Gibson won Game 1 of the 1988 World Series when he couldn't even jog. When Kirilloff was in too much pain to play, the Twins didn't say, hey just use one arm, dude, you don't need a trip to the IL. They put Kirilloff on the IL. The Twins didn't ask Kirilloff to get back out there directly from the surgical recovery room, either. The manipulation of context in your post is total BS.
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Yup. Kirilloff (LHB) and Mazara (LHB) line up pretty well. Career numbers: .256/.315/.414 OPS .719, .158 ISO, 7.3% BB, 22.0% K, wOBA .313 .249/.311/.414 OPS .715, .165 ISO, 7.0% BB, 24.1% K, wOBA .313 One is Kirilloff, one is Mazara. Neither is/was a good outfielder, but Mazara was at least close to league average where Kirilloff has been a black hole, though he could probably get better with consistent playing time. Combining the non-terrible defense with his added playing time, that's why Mazara owns a career 2.1 fWAR and Kirilloff owns a career 0.2.
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Kirilloff hasn't played injured. He's played "hurt" like every other baseball player has done, and it's no coincidence he performed essentially the same regardless of the type of injury; whether it's a wrist or a shoulder or whatever else. Basically a little below league average at the plate. The sample size on Kirilloff is pretty big at this point, and we have seen sustained production from him, just not sustained, unsustainable production. Last year was an outlier where Kirilloff enjoyed a BABIP 35 points higher than his career efforts. Kirilloff has mediocre power. He doesn't take walks. He's basically Nomar Mazara, who was out of baseball at age 27. The difference is the Twins didn't put it together as quickly as the Rangers did so the Twins are the White Sox in this scenario.
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Jenkins isn't hitting particularly well in Single A this year, though the sample size is small. Might want to see him play well for 100+ plate appearances before thinking about High A, let alone AA...
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- walker jenkins
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Rockies (Quantrill) vs Twins (Varland): 6/11/24, 6:40pm
bean5302 replied to Brock Beauchamp's topic in Archived Game Threads
Varland's velocity didn't just happen as he's been throwing hard since 2022, and he does not throw 99 in the rotation. His fastest pitch thrown this year was 98.3mph, and in only 2 games this year has he hit 97.2+mph on a single pitch while averaging 96mph. Btw, radar guns aren't perfect so when you see a few outliers all in a single game, the radar gun might just be hot or cool. Varland's status as a legitimate starting rotation prospect is a little dubious. He was recalled largely because he's a starter on the 40 man, and there isn't really anybody else at AAA who's pushing the Twins to add. His realistic ceiling if everything works out right is probably a #4 rotation arm because his pitches don't have good movement and he doesn't have a single "plus" offering in his arsenal while in the rotation. His pitches need to get better in terms of movement, not faster to succeed as a starter. He was a poor starter in 2023. He's been a poor starter in 2024, and he finds himself well behind SWR in the rotation mix at this point with a body of work consisting of 19 MLB starts over 3 years with a 5.56 ERA. as @Mike Sixel points out, that's starting to get to a significant sample size while his results have been consistently getting worse. -
The "untouchables" is an interesting concept. It means the team is so dependent on those players, they cannot be traded to improve the current team. To me, Jenkins is untouchable because his value has utterly tanked due to injury and performance in Single A ball this year. His ETA is 2026 at the earliest, but probably no significant play time until 2027. Brooks Lee, I'd be happy to trade if another team believed in him to the point he brought back part of a blockbuster deal, but people around here dramatically overvalue him. SSSS, but he certainly hasn't started hot in AAA, which is a level he couldn't hold his own at last year, either. He's a fringy shortstop with limited athleticism, without a ton of game power, who's proven so far to be weak as a RHB. Teams aren't falling over themselves to get a player like that in general. His draft position, and quick rise in the minors facilitated his spike in value... the same way Austin Martin rose up ranks right away. I'd really hate for the Twins to deal Rodriguez because there's a screaming loud, long term need for an outfielder who projects as a starter who can cover CF. Further down the list, there aren't any guys who could front line a truly high value acquisition.
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I don't see how pipelines would include veteran players. Ryan and Ober are both arb eligible next year so their team control is already starting to tick down. Festa's scuffling in AAA again this year with a 4.45 ERA over his past 7 starts with 3 of those not even getting through 5 frames. That doesn't project well. Zebby Matthews could be something with Andrew Morris climbing the ladder into a mid ranged prospect. It's been 7.5 years for Falvey to show his MiLB development team can produce starters, and Ober is the sole success story with SWR potentially paying off now, too. Falvey's on a very hot seat this year. He'll either see the Twins push into the playoffs or he'll be finding a new job.
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We’ve Reached a Prove-It Point With Kyle Farmer
bean5302 replied to Ted Schwerzler 's topic in Twins Daily Front Page News
Farmer is getting highly sporadic plate appearances, which is the worst thing for a guy trying to stabilize confidence or play at the plate. Also consider his xwOBA of .281 (still not great) is significantly higher than actual of .248. Farmer's only had 39 plate appearances in the past 35 days and is averaging less than 2 plate appearances per game played using the Baldelli Ultra Platoon method.- 29 replies
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- kyle farmer
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We’ve Reached a Prove-It Point With Kyle Farmer
bean5302 replied to Ted Schwerzler 's topic in Twins Daily Front Page News
I'm not sure Lewis wouldn't move to SS if Correa was hurt, but I agree, Lee is too far down the depth chart to get a call up with a single injury.- 29 replies
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- kyle farmer
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That's basically what this article is speculating. Pitch framing has gone away because Jeffers isn't trying to frame pitches anymore, he's setting pitchers up with an initial reference point of a full on meatball, and the pitcher is able to adjust based on that. This is possible because of the PitchCom system where the following is relayed to the pitcher after the last pitch "pitch".... "location" i.e. "slider... low and away" so the catcher doesn't need to position their glove where they'd like the actual pitch. Instead, by placing their glove at a center-center reference point, the pitcher can work off that reference to throw more strikes. It doesn't seem viable to me. I'm not a pitcher, but regardless of the sport, you keep your eyes fixated on a location as much as possible to maximize your chances of hitting that location. That makes me believe it's not likely this is actually happening a lot with a pitcher if that pitcher who is showing good control during the game. Pitchers are definitely going to miss their spots more with the speculated method. They'll throw more strikes, and more meatballs that'll end up in the seats and I'd much rather have a ball or two called than a home run allowed. Also, Vazquez has high framing numbers while Jeffers is poor in the category so lack of consistency with the catchers means this isn't likely a "Twins approach." Also, pitch framing often bounces around from year to year so I don't think it's a reliable or particularly valuable metric.
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I'm hoping he just jammed it, and the team had seen enough of him trying to play through it without a few days off. If he's only out for a week or two, it'll still give him plenty of time to get close to 100 plate appearances in at AAA before the deadline so the Twins could make a decision on whether or not he's ready for the big show. The question about Rodriguez is kinda the same as it was. Nobody is going to walk 25% of the time at MLB, so the 10% of the walks he's getting right now... will those become K's or batted balls? If they all become K's, he's probably not a viable MLB player. If they all become batted balls, he could be excellent, but there's probably a mix in there somewhere. Just my thoughts on it!
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- carlos santana
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Personally, I'd probably promote Emmanuel Rodriguez today to AAA and have him play CF while DaShawn Keirsey is on the IL. Evaluate Rodriguez's performance at AAA for the next month and a half and decide whether he's potentially ready for the big show.
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