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Road trip

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Everything posted by Road trip

  1. Road trip
    I'd largely agree with this. Wallner has options, this might be a good time to send him down for a month. Rocco has shown he won't play him regularly, so getting 4 ab's every day in St Paul might get Wallner back into rhythm. I'd give some of the playing time to Martin. Let's see if he can hit at this level. Same with Miranda, see if he can return to 2022 form. Larnach... I'd like to believe, but at this point I'm getting skeptical. I'd love to be wrong. Hopefully he takes this chance and breaks out, because this may well be his last chance.
  2. Road trip
    The important part is bolded. Wallner has been very bad, in the smallest of small sample sizes. His playing time has been very irregular at best which probably hasn't helped his timing. Two at bats here, one at bat there. He might need a AAA trip to get right, but it is way to early to question his potential to adjust. On the other hand, Rocco is playing the 38 year old Carlos Santana for a full game EVERY SINGLE DAY. Wallner's OPS is .513, which is bad. In twice as many plate appearances Santana is at .378, a number that many pitchers could achieve when they were allowed to hit. Santana is done. Dumped by the Royals, Pirates, Mariners, and Brewers, everyone in the league knew it, but our genius front office on a tight budget gave him $5 million when they could have just resigned Solano for a fraction of that cost. Wallner is one of many problems in the Twins offense. Unfortunately he is nowhere near the top problem.
  3. Road trip
    Calling balls and strikes perfectly is not possible for the human eye. I've done it many times at the youth level. I can live with blown calls that are at the top of the zone plus/minus an inch or two. It's a judgement call based on the varying height of the batter. The same is somewhat true on the low strike. The outside corner is simply a "best guess" if we are being honest. Calls are blown here all the time because umpires set up on the inside corner. It is physiologically impossible to catch that angle perfectly. What should never happen, ever, is a badly missed call on this inside corner. This happened on consecutive pitches to Wallner on Saturday. It was umpiring malpractice of the first rank, and it happens too often. I turned the game off shortly after that at bat. I didn't need the tv overlay box to see how bad those calls were. Yes, MLB should fix this. I'm quite ready for robo umps calling balls and strikes. It will be a better and fairer game, will cause the game to move more quickly, and will end the perceived injustice that so many fans nurse regarding ball and strike calls.
  4. Road trip
    Absolute incompetence behind the plate. Bring on the robo umps.
  5. Road trip
    It is not unique to the Twins organization or to Twins players, but MLB players as a whole spend far more time on the injured list now than they did a (half) generation ago. It isn't even close. And, no, I'm not talking about the medical dark ages.. From 1998 to 2015 MLB player days on the IL gradually rose from 22,000 to 30,000 days. 536 players spent time on the IL in 2015, a number that had been very gradually rising from 413 in 1998. Then the big jump came. Last year 821 MLB players spent time on the IL, and missed 44,661 days. Something has changed. It is fair to ask what, even if pinning down the answer(s) is difficult at this point. I'm sure the GM's, trainers, nutritionists, agents, doctors and everyone else involved in MLB is searching for answers because injuries benefit no one, and keeping a roster healthy is a key to winning and increasing revenue at both an individual and team level.
  6. Road trip
    I think it is because bad weather for opening day is very common, especially in northern climates. This gives MLB the ability to have a backup "opening day" for all the fans that bought tickets for the opener (often a sellout, always a big crowd) instead of making the scheduled game 2 the accidental default opener (rarely even close to a sellout except in baseball-crazy fan bases). You'll notice that Philly and the Mets delayed their home opener yesterday due to weather, and are playing it today. Meanwhile, the warm weather/domed stadiums were safely scheduled for game 2 of the season today, as game 1 was pretty much guaranteed to happen on schedule (Tampa, Houston, Seattle, etc).
  7. Road trip
    On the bright side (and I have to hunt pretty hard), Buxton is able to play center, and I do like him in the lead off spot. A worse scenario would be Buxton DH'ing with Margot in CF.
  8. Road trip
    I'll echo this. I've been four times now, and it is an experience every Twins fan should try to take in once. The actual spring training game is less interesting than what you experience on the back fields. Show up early, well before the game starting time! I made it again this year and was right on the chain link fence behind the plate watching Farmer, Kirilloff, Santana, Julien, and several others take live batting practice off of Balazovic and Thielbar. Several years ago I got to watch Rod Carew work with hitters on bunting, all from about 15 yards away. And as Riverbrian noted, you get to see a lot of minor leaguers at work, everything from top prospects to guys even rabid fans haven't heard of.
  9. Road trip
    Agreed. Plus an almost equal amount of hope on Paddack being both effective and healthy. Add in a little hope for Ryan and Ober too. I feel good about the lineup, the bench, the bullpen, and positional depth in the minors. But starting pitching... oof, it isn't hard to imagine a disaster if we get 1 injury and one of the top 3 starters has a bad year.
  10. Road trip
    Overall an excellent post on a complex topic. My only quibble would be the bolded part. There are very few if any players worth as much as the poorest owners (Ohtani is an outlier, nearly double the second largest contract, and he doesn't technically have most of that wealth yet... it is expected earnings). The Marlins are currently ranked as the least valuable MLB franchise, for a total of 1 billion dollars. The top 10 principal owners are all worth multiple billions of dollars. But your overall points stand and are good ones. Both MLB players and owners do very well financially, and prices for everything from tickets to ballpark beers will remain high because the market customers (fans) are quite willing to pay the prices being charged.
  11. Road trip
    Kirilloff to DH is quite depressing, given what we had hoped for him a couple of year ago. That he was a sub-par outfielder has long been known, but apparently turning him into an average 1B is also a lost cause? Santana at 1b every day is likely to be a big problem, absent a time machine. He hasn't hit well since 2019, especially against right handed pitchers. I know, as Twins fans we remember him as a feared hitter for Cleveland, but a lot of water has gone under the bridge since those days. Maybe he will have a last gasp bounce back season, but that is far more of a hope than a viable plan A. Honestly I'd place higher odds on a now healthy Miranda having viable offensive production at 1B than the 38 year old Santana.
  12. Road trip
    Well, yes, frequently, but if they can get two months of Brock Stewartesque production out of him before he breaks I'll call it a win. There have been a small number reclamation projects that have worked long term. I think you would have to consider Thielbar a success, and they called him back out of retirement after a five year absence from the majors. On the position player side, they seem to have found something in Willie Castro who was cast off by the Tigers. But I do somewhat agree. This is a lottery ticket signing. Small investment, small chance it pays off.
  13. Road trip
    I mean, I want to believe, but after Duran I only kinda, sorta believe the pen will be impressive. Jax basically has a two year track record. It's been mostly good, but there have been bad spells, as recently as last May. I think you can pencil him in as a solid B+ reliever, so of course he has value but I don't consider him elite yet. Stewart, love him, but he had a good 2 month stretch last year followed by a 2 month trip to the DL. Oh, and he was hurt for all of 2021 and most of 2022. I want to believe he will be healthy, but nothing in his recent past suggests he will make it through the year. He's the relief pitching version of Buxton. Thielbar is 37. *Shrugs*, could be good for another year, or could be near the end. Father time is undefeated... I'm also optimistic about Topa, but again, the sample size is small. What the Twins do have is a large number of bullpen pitchers who will possibly be good. If Rocco and his staff can quickly identify the right ones, great. I suspect we will see both some successes, as well as some abject failures and injuries. Hopefully more of the former than the latter. And of course the bullpen HAS to be good, because only in our wildest dreams is this year's starting rotation better than last year's rotation.
  14. Road trip
    Hard for me to like this trade. Maybe Noah Miller never learns to hit, but trading a recent first-rounder for a 29 year old backup outfielder who has pretty much proven to be a below-average MLB bat doesn't seem a good path to improvement. For a little more money we could have just re-signed Taylor and kept Miller. If money is so tight then give Martin a chance. Martin might hit well, while we pretty much know that Margot will be below average. I fear this means a summer of watching Margot play a lot of LF while Wallner sits on the bench. I'd live with this if the alternative was a proven hitter, but for Margot? Not a great scenario.
  15. Road trip
    Outstanding article. I've never really thought about the lack of high end international starters. This explains a large part of that story. Your guess regarding college opportunities is probably partially correct, but I think even more important is simply the age difference. International free agents can be signed at 15 (they have to turn 16 prior to Sept 1). Heck, these are High School sophomores in the US! You could argue that MLB should move the age limit up, but this potentially hurts the hundreds of International kids who at least get an opportunity to make a little money in the lowest levels of minor league ball, vs living a life of poverty in Venezuela, Panama, DR, etc. If you force them to wait until age 17 to sign, the opportunity may be gone. I'm not certain there is an easy answer. The odds are long for any athlete to be an elite starter. Clearly they are a little longer for the International signees.
  16. Road trip
    For certain, the "non-optional" guys make movement somewhat less likely in terms of sending them down. The flip side is that they are pretty old as a group, with most of them having a history of spending some time on the IL. For example, I believe Thielbar has been on the IL 5 times since 2021. At his age its simply to be expected he will make another trip or two to the IL at some point this year. Stewart, Topa, Jackson, Alcala, and Staumont all have some histories of health problems. I'd love to make it through a year with minimal injuries, but recent Twins history tells me to expect many of these guys to spend time on the IL.
  17. Road trip
    It's almost mind-boggling, but the number is much higher than 14. Last year the Twins used 29 pitchers. Only 6 of them were exclusively starters, leaving 23 for bullpen work. Oh, and 2023 was a good year. In 2022 the Twins used an astonishing 38 pitchers! You see numbers like this across the league. You can't have too much pitching depth. Some of us remember the good ole days when a team would get by with only a dozen total pitchers for the entire year! That isn't enough to get through April anymore. We will need every one of the guys mentioned in this article this year, along with a large number of others who didn't make this list.
  18. Road trip
    I'm optimistic that Wallner's defense in LF will improve as he becomes accustomed to playing on that side. LF is different than RF. The throws are different, the ball breaks off the bat a little differently, and it can be just a bit disorienting playing on the left side of the diamond after spending your entire life on the right side. There's a reason Kepler wants to stay in RF where he is comfortable.. In a failure of player development, Wallner was never prepped to play LF in the minors (a grand total of 11 games prior to 2023) while racking up hundreds of games in RF. He went from looking extremely clumsy in LF early last year to just-a-little clumsy by the end of the season. If increased reps and experience can get Wallner to "average" on his jumps and reads, we could have a pretty good left fielder thanks to his cannon of an arm.
  19. Road trip
    Agree. I also look at Lewis and see a young guy with a big frame. He's still listed at 200lbs, but that is an old number. It wouldn't shock me if he fills out with just a bit more muscle and ends up playing at the 215-220lbs range, which is really large for a 2nd baseman. I'd keep him at 3rd.
  20. Road trip
    Well, I don't really disagree with your point regarding player development in the Ryan years. It wasn't great, but it wasn't ZERO. Wilson Ramos was traded away for Capps, which was unfortunate, but Ramos was developed and had great value. The Twins just made a bad trade with that value. (and Ramos had the misfortune to get continually hurt after a great rookie season in Washington) Denard Span and Ben Revere both had decent, but not great careers. Span unfortunately didn't bring much value back when traded. Revere got us several good years of Trevor May. Brian Dozier is arguably one of the great development stories in Twin history, as he was never considered more than a middling prospect, but had a few great years. You could add Trevor Plouffe to the position player list as well, and possibly Danny Valencia and the legendary Drew Butera, although we are kind of stretching the boundaries of "successful" at this point. Glen Perkins is probably the lone pitcher from that era that would be remembered as a development success. That may be the real problem. No quality starter was developed in that entire decade (Liriano came up just a hair earlier).
  21. Road trip
    I guess my point is *IF* the Twins have significant money to spend, I hope it goes to pitching. I'd rather roll with Miranda/Kirilloff/Bargain Bin at 1B than rely on Woods Richardson/Sands/Bargain Bin in the starting rotation. We will have to trust youth someplace, and I think the young hitters are ahead of the young starting pitchers. And believe me, I hope my pessimism regarding next year's payroll is wrong... but that lost TV revenue is really a budget hole. I don't know how you do a short term fix for the missing 55M revenue stream without payroll budget cuts.
  22. Road trip
    No, if I'm honest, I don't think they will spend big on pitching. They'll get a veteran bullpen guy, relatively cheap, essentially replacing Pagan's salary slot. They might sign or trade for a #3 starter hoping they will turn him into a #2. More likely they sign a #4, hoping he can become a #3. I agree that one of Polanco or Kepler is gone, and possibly both. Possibly add Farmer to the list too. Vazquez, I sort of hope they find someone to take his salary but I suspect most of the league thinks his bat is cooked. Most catchers age badly, and he isn't young. I mean, it seems apparent that they intend to cut salary. I hate it, but also understand it if they can't get some kind of stable and predictable revenue from local TV. I don't think they are surrendering, but do think it is going to be more of a "buy a lottery ticket and hope to get lucky" kind of year. I expect them to bet on the health of Correa and Buxton (what choice do they have?). I expect them to bet on improvement from the young bats, of which there are a large number. Same with pitching, where they will hope the youngsters improve, and they mostly stay healthy? An awful lot of things will have to break right for the Twins to be a serious pennant contender next year... but it could happen. Of course with this plan, it is at least equally likely that they win about 80 games and finish 2nd or 3rd in the Central. I've probably been a Twins fan for too long. Hope is in short supply. At least I'm not a Vikings fan 😆
  23. Road trip
    Room in the lineup? Yes, there is likely room, especially if Buxton plays the field instead of DH-ing (I'm a dreamer..). Room in the (reduced) payroll? I fear not. If we have to save funds (unfortunately), I'd try to save at 1B, where Kirilloff, Miranda, an untested minor league guy (Severino), or a non roster spring training contract (Hosmer? Wil Myers?) could potentially give us coverage on the cheap. And frankly I don't want to block Kirilloff if he returns healthy. If we spend money on Hoskins, it means we are getting by on additional unproven players in the starting rotation or bullpen, because payroll space is short. I'd rather spend the money on pitching.
  24. Road trip
    I understand, and agree they aren't likely to spend the savings, but I fear that if they don't trade him then somebody else that is marginally expensive will have to go who might otherwise stay (perhaps all of Polanco, Kepler, and Farmer instead of just one or two of them). Vazquez might bounce back next year... but consider the consequences if he doesn't. His contract would be untradeable in the 2024 off-season if he has another bad year. Then the Twins are really stuck for another year in 2025. I know Rocco likes to rotate catchers, and it worked well last year, but by using off-days strategically he could essentially start Jeffers 100 games and Camargo for 60. Camargo will be 25 next year, so he is probably about as ready as he is ever going to be. Both are young so you can at least hope for good health. Sign a career backup to a Triple A contract as insurance.
  25. Road trip
    I don't know if the Brewers intend to contend next year... they may be in full fire-sale mode. But if they want to contend, 2b was a black hole of dismal hitting for them last year. Maybe Brice Turang will develop, but I sure wouldn't feel much hope after he OPS'd .585 last year.
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