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arby58

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Everything posted by arby58

  1. arby58
    Hitting into a double play - yet you've put the ball in play.
  2. arby58
    I compared him to Acuna because the post suggested Arraez might win the MVP this year - which is absurd. Please, read with some context.
  3. arby58
    There seems to be so much angst about Ks with fans here. It's an out - teams will have far more of them a game than players reach base safely. Sure, it's generally not productive, but it isn't the abject failure it's sometimes made out to be. Power hitters generally strike out a lot. The career leaders in strikeouts all fit that characterization. In 1962, Harmon Killebrew struck out a career high 142 times - but also 48 home runs.
  4. arby58
    Is the current Gallo really a 'failure narrative?' His OPS leads the team among qualified players. That alone suggests otherwise. For all their 'failures' the Twins remind me a bit of the much-loved 1987 Twins. They were 85-78 in the regular season - which is certainly a record this Twins team could achieve. They were well below league average in batting average, a bit above average in runs scored, and the pitching was suspect (and this team differs from them there). Still, they two decent starting pitchers, and they caught fire at the right time and won it all. Players like Gallo can get hot and carry a team for a week at a time - you need those types at the right time.
  5. arby58
    If that is Arraez' only job, fine, but baseball is far more nuanced than that. The ultimate job for any offensive player is to produce runs - and it's a lot harder to produce one while standing on first than if on second, third or rounding the bases after a home run. It's also complicated if you don't run particularly well. The fact remains that Arraez isn't scoring many runs for a player with his batting average, and some of the blame falls on him mostly standing on first base after his base hits.
  6. arby58
    The Gallo to Arraez comparison was to make a point, and it is still valid - singles hitters don't contribute to an offense the way hitters do with more power. The best example right now is Atlanta's Acuna. Arraez is still hitting an all-world .388 - good for him. Acuna is hitting 'just' .335. So, big edge for Arraez, right? The story ends there, because Acuna has scored over twice as many runs (77 to 37), hit seven times as many home runs (21 to 3), and has an OPS of 1.011 versus Arraez' .917. I had to LOL at a recent post that suggested Arraez could win the NL MVP - not if this statistical comparisons hold up.
  7. arby58
    Well, 200.2 innings pitched for the Twins, 12-6 record, ERA of 3.13, with 201 Ks and 32 walks - that is a damn good line for a starting pitcher. If that isn't a number one starting pitcher, my guess is any team in baseball would take that as their number two.
  8. arby58
    I'm a finance guy, so I also 'get' what you are saying about long versus short term investments. That said, please note that your comparison starts with an 'if' statement related to Perry. There is no 'if' associated with Gray - he has been a solid starting pitcher, and that's not really a fair way of stating it either. Over the last season and a half, he is 12-6 with an ERA around 3. That is not just 'decent' that is very good. Further, the Twins are in contention this year to win their division. Last time I checked, as a fan, I'm interested in them winning in the present, not just the future. As Keynes once put it, 'in the long run, we're all dead.'
  9. arby58
    First, the Twins this year aren't a 'bad team.' They still have a strong possibility to win the division, they are not the Royals or As, and they need strong starting pitching to do so, because their offense is inconsistent. Gray has provided them that. Second, you are assuming Perry will become at least as solid a major league pitcher. Given the 'time value' situation of the present versus the future, he will have to perform very well for several years to make up for that.
  10. arby58
    In finance, present value represents the current value of future cash flows, based on the principle that money in the present is worth more than money in the future. I'd argue this same principle applies in a baseball trade where you get a 'known quantity' to use in the present, in exchange for a somewhat unknown quantity that could have great value in the future. That is the Gray versus Perry situation, and I won't regret the trade if Petty becomes an ace, taking into consideration the number of years in the future that may be and the inherent risks associated with what was a teen aged pitcher. If he pans out, this will probably be a relatively even trade, and that is still a big if. Meanwhile, Gray has been a very solid major league starting pitcher in both years; if the Twins choose not to pursue him next year, they will still have gotten a good return on the Perry investment, IMHO.
  11. arby58
    It's a good point - you can't just view a draft by its first round. There are plenty of first round busts in baseball, and plenty that become all stars from later rounds.
  12. arby58
    I'd flip Lee and Lewis at this point. Lewis is a significant contributor at the major league level, and Lee isn't exactly setting the world on fire at AA. That said, I expect to see them both playing the infield for the Twins in a couple of years.
  13. arby58
    Miranda butchered first base last year, and his defense at third doesn't suggest he will become the second coming of Don Mattingly. If anybody is moving to first base, it may well be Julien.
  14. arby58
    I like Polanco (he could always hit) and his contract is team friendly, but that isn't going to get you a 'top prospect' given his injury concerns and the position he plays. You'll probably get a couple of mid-level prospects for him. I'd keep him, play him when he's healthy, and accept that there will be plenty of at bats for your tier of veterans (Farmer, Solano) or young players (Julien, Lewis).
  15. arby58
    Judging the Arraez trade after a few months is premature. We were all sad to see Nelson Cruz go, but the Twins got Joe Ryan for a few months of him (can't complain about that one). I was sad to see Eduardo Escobar go too - he was a fan favorite. The pain subsided when Jhoan Duran turned into one of the best closers in baseball. Yes, the Twins lost the Presley trade, but you can't win them all. Berrios hasn't exactly tore up baseball since leaving the Twins. He was 12-7 with a 5.23 ERA and 1.42 WHIP last year. This year is better, at 6-4, 3.61 ERA and 1.23 WHIP, but that would still slot around 3 or 4 in terms of performance of Twins starting pitchers this year. Eddie Rosario was maddingly inconsistent - and that continues to date. He had a pedestrian 2020 with Cleveland (.685 OPS, which is Kepler-like without the defense) before catching fire latter half of the year with Atlanta (.903 OPS) and was great in the play-offs. Then he had a really crappy last year (.587 OPS) and is just average this year. Who knows with him? Also, for the Kepler haters, his career WAR is 17.1 in 7 full seasons and Rosario's is 10.7 in 8 full seasons.
  16. arby58
    I'm not following how Jeffers can be 5-0 in his last 8 as the starter. Are you treating him like a pitcher, where if he leaves the game and it is tied, it doesn't count? I don't think that is an accurate way to do it, for several reasons. Regardless, this seems like a stat with way too many exogenous variables to have much predictive value.
  17. arby58
    They're paying him $10 million a year for three years, so it's not a super big albatross - and baseball's only salary cap is a team's internal budget. The barrel rate chart is a bit unfair, comparing 1/3 of a season to 3/3rds of a season. Your stats are otherwise solid, but catcher (along with SS and to some extent CF) is a position where defense comes first, and offense is gravy. For now, the pitching staff looks good, and you have to give the catchers some credit for that. Even so, Jeffers is starting to impress at the plate, so this may work itself out.
  18. arby58
    Brad Radke had that as well.
  19. arby58
    This starting staff is really solid, and it's great to know that at least 4 of the 5 will be back next year. The Twins need maybe one more shut down arm in the bullpen. They've been competitive with the best teams so far this year. Now, with Lewis and Kirilloff back, they sort of remind me of the Phillies last year - if they get hot, watch out.
  20. arby58
    First, the Twins ARE a homerun hitting team - among 30 MLB teams, they have the 7th most home runs. By contrast, they are 14th in runs scored. As for Arraez, he had lots of endearing qualities, but statistically he does just one thing really well - get on first base. Of his 68 hits, 55 are singles, 11 doubles, 1 triple, 1 HR. As a result, even with a .376 BA, his OPS is .897. That's very good, but it's not other-worldly. Even more concerning is the fact with all those times on base, he's only scored 19 runs - that is far fewer than the 31 Byron Buxton has scored for the Twins. The fact is it's a lot tougher to score from first than the other hits, and he also doesn't run particularly well. Sure, it would be nice to have his OBP in the lineup (although I suspect the average will fall as the year goes on), but it's really hard to score a lot of runs with primarily singles hitters.
  21. arby58
    I would change that to too much of the same level of talent. The guys we're talking about are mostly average to slightly above average at this point in time. The difference with some is we know their ceiling (Kepler in particular). At least with Larnach and Wallner there is probably room to grow.
  22. arby58
    Every hitter will have up and down weeks/months. Gallo may be injured to the point it is impacting his numbers. Still, it's hard to argue with the cumulative numbers: he leads the team in home runs, 2nd in runs scored, 3rd in RBIs, has the highest OPS (.862) among those who have played the entire regular season, 3rd in WAR but only 6th in total at bats. Gallo is not the problem.
  23. arby58
    Is he really that bad defensively? He has a cannon of an arm - teams will stop running on him based on that. When you can make 97 mph throws from right field, that is an asset.
  24. arby58
    They rank 6th in home runs - like it or not, this isn't a team that is going to regularly string together three hits to score a run. Joey Gallo has 21 his on the season, and an incredible 15 of them are extra base hits. The good news is just a week ago, the Twins were last in batting average, so they're moving up - as is Gallo, whose batting average is now 'up' to .214.
  25. arby58
    The front office gets dumped on a lot, but the depth they added has been really important. Add Solano to that list - his fielding is sometimes an 'adventure' but he is as good as advertised against left handed pitching. Also the pickup of Stewart is looking like a really good move - the guy has been far more than could have been asked since coming over from St. Paul.
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