LaBombo

Possible endorsement opportunity for him. "Stauffer: It's what you warm up when the day's gone to hell..."

But the punch line never gets old. 'Twas ever thus... Wade Boggs' career splits: Home: .354/.443/.491 / .934 118 OPS+ 362 2B in 4590 AB Away: .302/.387/.395 / .781 82 OPS+ 216 2B in 4590 AB And yes, he finished his career elsewhere, but in his 11 seasons with Boston he never posted a road OPS+ above 98 or a home OPS+ below 102. In fact he surpassed a road OPS+ of 82 just twice and surpassed a home OPS+ of 120 six times in that span. So maybe there's something to that whole park effect thing after all. Or else Boggs just really grooved on that hometown fan love from the unfailingly sunny Boston fans and their universally positive chatter.

Threw a deuce, dropped a deuce, tomayto, tomahto. The important thing is that Pelfrey can reclaim the rotation spot he's due by the divine right of his half dozen nice spring training innings.

At the risk of incurring the wrath of TD mods, here's my visual album of the torid but brief love affair between Twins fans and Ervin Santana: December 12, 2014 signing: http://ak-hdl.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/webdr06/2013/8/29/19/anigif_enhanced-buzz-4623-1377817997-14.gif April 3, 2015 suspension: http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/08/07/article-2385908-1B2FD065000005DC-279_634x345.jpg http://www.themotorreport.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ferrisbueller-2-thumb.jpg http://www.houses.com/SiteNewsArticles/Ben_Rose_Ferris2.jpg Note to mods: Sorry for the excessive use of images in a non-game thread. If it helps, consider the images withdrawn from the excess pixels accrewed in my account during my four month winter hibernation...

Very good take on the overall pluses and minuses of the deal itself and what it means to the big picture. As an aside probably several people have wondered if that small step backward was perhaps very small, if not a net sideways. The 2014 walk rate was up from the 2013 rate, but that 2013 rate was his career low, and conspicuously lower than his career average. And while higher the 2014 rate was right in line with his career average. Meanwhile the strikeout rate rose as one would expect with the transition to the national league. But it was not only much higher than 2013's, it was a full K per 9 higher than his career rate. There's no exact formula for perfectly predicting added K rate in the AL to NL switch, but it seems to me that most of the stuff out there says that starters tend to gain about .5 K/9 going to the NL. So that would account for only about half of the increase. At the very least, the switch didn't mask a decline. The ERA increase to nearly 4 in 2014 is what jumps out at most people initially, and it shouldn't be disregarded purely as anomaly, but it's more or less upside down from both the FIP and xFIP in that both markedly improved in 2014. Then there's the fact that Santana endured a 2014 BABIP spike of over 30 points above his career average. The 2013/2014 contrast looks even more favorable, with an inevitable 2014 ERA increase coming with along with the whopping 50 point in increase in BABIP Haven't seen Santana throw a ton of innings and the pitchFX stuff will always be a mystery to me. But a few things jumped out at me. Having thrown his changeup right around 7% of the time in his career, Santana roughly doubled that in '14. It only graded/fx'ed average, but the net result was that Santana quietly went from being what effectively amounted to a two pitch starter to a three pitch one. Velocity of all three equaled 2013. Plate discipline numbers are harder to get a bead on. Swinging strikes were up, but how much of that was opposing pitchers flailing away like a kid at a pinata? Overall, it seemed that the numbers were consistent with 2013. Where there were small changes, improvements appeared to outnumber declines. Although the small trends I've noted are pretty trivial individually, taken together they tell me that to the extent you can determine with the league change, Santana seems to have pitched pretty much as well in 2014 as he did the prior year. It's not revelatory, but it's pretty good to know when you commit $55M/4 to a pitcher who just pitched through the beginning of the expert slope portion of the aging curve.

This is probably an odd and unpopular take, but one reason not to move Dozier is Sano. If he's healthy, can hit and play a passable third base at AAA by midseason, it would be nice to see the Twins test the market for Plouffe. But it would be hard to do that for a team that's trying to build and spend back to respectability if they've moved their other good late 20's infielder and still have it look like there's an easily understood roadmap for relevancy in the coming season and contention soon after. There's no pressing need to move either unless someone like the Giants, who are rumored to be interested in trading an A-/B+ starter prospect from their bottomless barrel of them, overpay a bit for Plouffe. Dozier is better, younger and less imminently replaceable with a superior player from the minors. If you can only trade one, it's Plouffe.

Perhaps some former parliament members of the Tory party could help with the hunt. Nice summary of the Twins organizational tendency to succumb to the entropy of descent down the defensive spectrum. Is there any team in MLB with a younger aggregate franchise age and more players being credibly considered for defensive demotions? Not a good trend for a contender. A terrible one for a rebuilder.

Lagging on likes for your posts I've been trying to get caught up on, as well as some of the other great regular contributors here. Well done. And your point about the Twins' tapping of the metro area's food-monikered baseball talent is well taken. This year Mark Hamburger, next year... Mike Carp!!! Meant Trout. F#@%. I hate getting rusty.

Not in the bathroom, unfortunately, which is where I mostly do my best TD'ing. Ok in the war room if I wave the iPad around in the air, especially if I act like I just don't care. But if my role as an occasional and ineffectual Twins analyst were on the line, I'd p!ss on a spark plug if I thought it would help. Happy holidays!

If Nolasco is "entrenched", then Gibson is in a heavily fortified CP bunker. Hughes is here, playing Wargames with WOPR until pitchers and catchers report. http://www.imfromdenver.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/cheyenne-mountain-complex-colorado-springs-colorado.jpg Meanwhile, Pelfrey is jumping up and down in plain sight of enemy lines wearing a bullseye T-shirt and holding a 'Shoot Me' sign above his head. If the Twins are counting on him to make any contribution whatsoever, let alone hold down a rotation spot, it will be very disappointing. Give the guy a shot at a bullpen role and see what he can do. Maybe the lesser workload and the ability to let it fly, combined with potentially improved health, will do him some good. By all accounts he is a good guy who is highly motivated and respected by his teammates, making him easy to root for. But if the Twins are even considering handing Pelfrey a rotation spot based on a few meaningless spring training innings, there are at least two problems that come to mind. First, it's an additional sign (the Hunter acquisition being the most discouraging) that the Twins are planning on mailing in the 2015 season. Second, it's further evidence that they steadfastly refuse to stop the doomed practice of microsample exhibition games as a primary tool for player evaluation and roster construction. Having been a bit of a pessimist (watch for me at the Understatement Awards) about the Twins recently, the first issue is neither surprising nor a huge letdown to me. So the second is the more troubling. Aside from the admirable toils of Jack Goin, this franchise has exhibited an attitude toward modern metrics that spans a range from casual disdain to lukewarm interest to shocking ignorance to outright contempt. It's not surprising that the Twins have been strongly influenced by a running 25+ year narrative about a David out-scouting, out-hustling, and generally out-contrarian-ing MLB's Goliaths. If people keep telling you you're great at something because of how you do it, how hard would you try to tell yourself they're wrong? But baseball metrics have evolved from the age of alchemy in the late 80's to the Newtonian physics phase they're in now. And the Twins are having a tough time adapting. Based apparently almost solely on the eye candy scouting tests administered in spring training, they've brought players north who could probably be improved upon with guys in the Twin Cities who have never played in the majors. There's probably a '25th man irrelevancy' slant to this discussion that I'm missing. That being said, if Pelfrey gets a spot in the rotation because he whiffs some washup three times in one start who was cut from the Nippon Ham Fighters or the Lansing Lugnuts in a game that the big wheel in the Twins scouting machine happens to be watching, it's going to be challenging to get behind some of their upcoming personnel moves.

Probably not a good sign for a personnel move when the most ardent proponents of it stress that "it's only a one year deal". Interesting thought experiment. How many seconds could the average TD poster listen to Dave St. Peter attempt to explain what this signing helps the Twins accomplish without, given the option and the means, Tasering him? If the over/under is 20, I'm taking out a loan to bet on the under. If nothing else, this move provided a moment of priceless comic irony. A proud, supposedly rebuilding franchise in a sad state of decay and that has been widely criticized for its abhorrence of metrics signed a 39 year old outfielder who was statistically a replacement-level player last year. Then they provided a venue for him to publicly urinate on metrics and the people who pay attention to them. The Twins are run by a man who allegedly went to college and majored in PR/marketing/BS/whatever. So that, not baseball knowledge, finance, or overall strategy, is his supposed strong suit. Having some doubts about how that works out.

I'm with the consensus that Duensing and Nunez are the questionable ones, but they're of little consequence now that the Twins have publicly announced with the Hunter signing that they have no intention of either contending or even of being taken seriously as a professional sports franchise under the existing front office regime.

That's not even halfway to arrogant. That's just the reality of the market and of his perceived value as the nerdy David who's been slaying AL East Goliaths for years with nothing but a laptop, a sling, and a pouch full of pebble-sized salaries.

The minute Maddon hit the open market life began to suck at least a little for somewhere between a half and a full dozen current managers.

I would actively seek to organize a boycott and protests if the Twins make ANY relevant decisions based on a tiny sum of organizational pocket change owed Ron Gardenhire, let alone made the mind-bogglingly stupid mistake of passing on Joe Maddon. I would be more likely to expend time and energy on following whatever team Maddon went to if that happened than a Twins organization with only a faint interest in winning.

Nope, I didn't guess correctly. Befuddled because my top choice, 'e. All of the above' was missing, and also because I remembered that my next pick, '1950', was actually the year that USMC General Oliver P. Smith said of the Battle of the Chosin Reservoir in Korea, "Retreat, hell! We're not retreating, we're just advancing in a different direction!" Fortunately for the good citizens of South Korea, General Smith was as good as his word. Still hoping Ryan and the Twins will be too.

Good comp, even if it's by accident. Leius really was a bench player, getting just 235 AB's in '91 primarily as a pinch hitter and the minority half of what essentially amounted to a straight platoon with Pagliarulo (man I miss Hartman trying to say his name). Like Plouffe he was a shortstop who shifted to third, and like Plouffe he had a serious platoon split that made him a poor option against righties who was miscast as a regular. If Sano isn't the answer at third, the Twins need to find an upgrade over Plouffe, or at least a strong leftie platoon mate.

Thanks for posting that. It's a good summary of what unspecial seasons some of the postseason 3b's had, and a surprising one to boot. Also an object lesson on not focusing too much on one position with regard to building a contender. Well done. But a couple of things about TP's value as a starter. Plouffesie's increased WAR was as much a product of his defense as his offense, and that's the less reliable component of the two. His defense looked better to me, but not night and day better. The bigger thing is his age. Some late bloomers do have the light bulb come on at 28 and become a good hitter after being an average (or even bad) one. But more often, they're guys having a fluke season at a very common age for an average player to have a career year, at least according to BProp's aging curve. Plouffe had a negative career WAR prior to this season. His career year at the plate resulted in a .258/.328/.423 slash. While his defense at third improved at third, it wasn't Koskian, let alone BrooksRobinsonian. And yet he was a plus player. His overall offense can take a small step back and still have some value. His defense at third seems to be a modest but genuine plus. He can play multiple defensive positions, including the critical middle infield spots, without getting a GM fired on the spot. His platoon splits suggest that he has value as an RH bat off the bench. That has the ring of an amazing utility player. Ok, not Zobresque, but really a plus to a young team, either as roster duct tape or juicy trade leach. PS In Minnesota, leaches are used as bait way more than medical treatment devices.

Can we platoon Hunter with Jacques Jones on the field and off?

http://thesouloftheplot.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/abeautifulfriendship.jpg

Miguel Sano did not play baseball in 2014 after just half a season at AA in 2013. Byron Buxton had just over 100 AB's in A ball and hit .240/.313/.405. How those facts scream "Start the season in the majors" is beyond me. But you're right. There's no need to need to go down the service time path with any players any more now that we know that impending free agency is such a critical factor that some agents will not allow their on-the-clock players to sign an "extension" that goes beyond free agency eligibility, and at least one will not even allow an extension UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. In other words, service time doesn't just matter, it is a powerful economic force in determining future contract status. Period.

In my admittedly limited and probably warped experience, one of the few relatively civilized ways to come across as almost as much of a dink as someone who habitually corrects people and is factually wrong in doing so is to take a whiz on optimism. That being said, 30 teams would have attempted to improve 15 games over the last 10 years 300 times. 24 did. Maybe a couple did more than once. That still means that there's probably less than a ten percent chance of getting that done. Hats off to the frogs that made it across the road, but from a strictly actuarial standpoint... Although I'm not a big fan of either 'Logan's Run'ning the 30+er's off the roster or playing kids barely old enough to shave or drive in the name of rebuilding, my preference in this situation is young player development over optimizing for 85 wins instead of 79. My general impression is that such a philosophy might somehow have cost the 1991 Twins the most famous World Series victory in modern history, but is also much less likely to see the Twins wasting time and money girding their loins against a losing season on the way to competitive relevance. Apologies to any family members of Correia, Butera, and any others who might be emotionally damaged by visualizing their kin being exploited by covering the Twins' naughty bits.

That seems even more true in the postseason. Almost all bets are off with regard to the implications of stressing the bullpen, and managers are usually even more hesitant to be the guy who left the starter in too long. Jack Morris is sort of the exception to prove the rule. The virtually unprecedented act of having him retake the mound in the tenth would have gotten Kelly tarred and feathered in the media (and a good chunk of the fan base) if the Twins had lost on a run Morris gave up that inning. Of course many people at the game would probably defend the move if it led to a loss with a simple 'you had to be there'. The image of him taking the mound and the crowd reaction is as indelible as any play in a Series absolutely full of them.

At this point my choice basically boils down to 'whichever qualified candidate is least likely to give Goin crap and/or ignore him'.

While I agree with the general idea of rebuilding as a primary goal, as opposed to going all in on avoiding 90 losses (or even a losing season), there's a problem with this scenario. Sano didn't play this season, Buxton struggled through just over a hundred plate appearances in high A, and Berrios pitched 43 innings above A ball. The painful 2013 of Aaron Hicks is a cautionary tail of what happens when a franchise enters a season with a prospect and one other option as the only realistic options for a position. Although it was nice to see some dead wood trimmed this season (Willi, Correia, etc) the Twins need to make sure they have some competent options in case the prospects aren't ready. They should be affordable enough to be able to more or less discard if/when the prospects are ready, but avoiding a Colby Rasmus now is an open invitation to ending up with 300 plate appearances for a Clete Thomas later.