twinbythebay

For what it's worth, the numbers do back up your conclusion here. Donaldson's OPS in high leverage situations (as defined by Fangraphs) is a putrid .293 this season, although that is only based on 11 PAs. His OPS in low and medium leverage situations is .860 and .658, respectively, this season. This is exactly opposite of how he has performed throughout his career (.849/.889/.959 low/medium/high leverage, respectively), so I suspect this will turn around soon as well.

Looking into Donaldson's offensive numbers a little deeper does provide some reason for optimism. His BABIP this season is just .240, well below his career average of .296. Also, his batted ball profile this season is very much in line with his career numbers (18%/45%/37% GB/LD/FB in 2021 vs. 18%/43%/39% career), and his HR/FB rate (12.8%) is well below his career rate (19.0%). Given that his exit velocity is still in the top 10% of the league, it's very reasonable to expect his batted balls to begin turning into hits at a higher clip and more of his fly balls to turn into HRs going forward. His defense seems like a different story, unfortunately... He is much slower now than at any point in his career, and he's likely only going to get slower. A good arm and good instincts can make up for some of that, but I'm afraid his time being considered as one of the top defensive 3Bs in the league is likely over.

...and Byung-ho Park. Let's hope his career tends more towards those other well-known baseball men.

That's not necessarily surprising. The guy still has games like this in him every once in awhile. He had a 7-inning, 1-run start with 5 Ks for the Twins last season. It's just that these starts are few and far between for him at this point in his career. If the Twins had held on to Hill instead of signing Shoemaker, I don't think they'd be in a much different position than they are now. I think the back end of the rotation is pretty low on the list of reasons for the poor results this season.

To be honest, this seems like a fair idea given that most of the team is playing like they're suffering from a severe case of butt fungus.

I think they were betting on Shoemaker being a bounce-back candidate this season after his past few injury plagued seasons, plus he's seven years younger than Hill. For what it's worth, Hill hasn't exactly been lighting it up with Tampa Bay this season (4.26 ERA in 8 starts, averaging less than 5 innings per start), but he hasn't been as bad as Shoemaker. I think the guys mentioned in this article (plus the rest of the bullpen) are much more to blame for the poor start to the season than the fifth man in the rotation anyway.

I think we both know how the Pohlads (or anyone else in the Twins org) would answer a question like that. They're not going to throw the manager under the bus in the media, and they're certainly not going to fire the manager because of a bad six week stretch. Any dissatisfaction is going to be handled internally, and I think that would be the case with any MLB club. They've played 35 games, and there are 127 games remaining... I know we're all just frustrated and venting here, but we've got a long way to go and Rocco ain't going anywhere this season.

I'm curious about what specifically you'd like the media to do or say, and what you think would change because of it. I think the team and the organization is well aware of how badly this season is going and how frustrated all of the fans are. What answers would satisfy you? I don't think anyone really has any answers at this point.

It's incredible how every single high-leverage situation seems to turn out poorly for the Twins this season, on both sides of the ball. I know it feels like clockwork to all of us fans at this point, and it looks like the players have that same "here we go again" mindset in big situations. This team desperately needs someone to step up in some big situations and help everyone shake off that mindset. Maybe someone needs to sacrifice a chicken in the clubhouse or something?

Agreed that Rocco should try extending the starters a little more. But when the bats stop scoring in the second inning and every dang reliever comes in and gives up multiple runs, as was the case last night (and about 20 other times this season), there really is no simple solution. The starters can pitch deeper into games, but it still won't matter if the bullpen and late-game offense both continue to be this inept.

Definitely fair points. I didn't consider the inherited runners issue until after I posted that, but that has indeed been a big issue for this bullpen. The starters do deserve some blame for putting those runners on base, but the bullpen has been especially awful about letting those runners score this season. The bullpen's Inherited Score % (proportion of inherited runners that they allow to score) is a ghastly 64% this season, which is by far the highest in MLB. The next highest Inherited Score % is 51% (PHI), and the league average is 35%. If the Twins bullpen allowed inherited runners to score at just a league average rate, the team would have given up 13 fewer runs than they have so far this season already! Talk about excruciating numbers...

I see this complaint a lot from Twins fans, so I looked a little deeper into the (indeed, excruciating) pitching numbers this season. Twins starters have pitched 59.6% of the team's total innings so far this season, which ranks 12th in MLB, so pretty much league average. Given the bullpen's struggles, it's reasonable to suggest that the Twins should be giving more innings to their starters. However, the ERA of Twins starters in the 5th inning and beyond this season is 5.01 (25th in MLB), so you can see why Rocco might be hesitant to let his starters pitch deeper into games. This is a bit better than the bullpen's overall ERA of 5.26 ? but not by much. Looking a little deeper, the starters' FIP in innings 5+ is 5.72 (29th in MLB) compared to 4.85 for the bullpen, and the starters' xFIP in innings 5+ is 4.91 (27th in MLB) compared to 4.1 for the bullpen. Looking at these numbers, it's hard for me to conclude that letting the starters pitch deeper into games will lead to better results for the team. Right now, they just desperately need anyone who can pitch capably in the latter half of games.

This was a valid criticism for the Terry Ryan era Twins, but they have been much more aggressive with promoting their prospects under the Falvine regime (see Arraez, Jeffers, Kirilloff, Larnach...)

I just noticed that, very nice touch! Considering France are the defending World Cup champs, maybe that's a good sign? I'm just grasping for optimistic straws at this point...

Congrats @Mill1634 for helming the maiden game thread voyage of the new and improved Twins Daily! Let's hope this helps return the mojo that the Twins have been missing for the past month or so...