Riverbrian

Committing to Kepler and Gallo with Wallner on the roster is a quadruple down. Falvey and Lavine saying help won't be coming from the outside was the triple down. All the playing time is the double down. Never thought I'd see a quadruple down in my lifetime. We already have left handed hitting outfielders is... uff da... rather chilling.

I have looked it up... many many times. Don't just look at Buxton... look at the entire team. It isn't good across the board.

I remember that well. Lewis was sent down after hitting a home run and double against the A's. Royce was near .900 OPS over 11 games while Jose Miranda had a batting average under .100. When Correa came back from injury. They kept Miranda and they sent Royce down to AAA to play other positions so he could come up to the majors and play other positions. I don't have the quote from the Rocco or the front office but they didn't want to move him to utility at the major league level... learn on the fly I guess. So they sent him down to St. Paul on May 18. Royce played 17 Innings at 3B, 18 Innings in LF and 10 Innings in CF and they called him back up to the majors on May 29. After 45 innings at other positions... he was now ready for other positions. I also think that it is fair to point out that Royce Lewis played nothing but SS in 2022 prior to the injury to Carlos Correa on May 6. So if you put it all together. It took Royce 45 innings of other positions to be ready for major league utility work. Despite the presence of Carlos Correa... the Twins never prepped Royce Lewis for major league utility work prior to the Carlos Correa injury. Yeah... They could blow this upcoming Julien thing.

Who gets the zone rating punishment on that double to the first baseman?

A sweep feels good. Hopefully they can reel off some more. A nice winning streak would do wonders for the players and fans. These are all major league teams with major league talent. A sweep feels good. On the part of the article that I have quoted. Kepler could have easily ran underneath that ball for an out. I don't know who was calling for it or if nobody was calling for it. However, Kepler needs to take charge on that ball. Ball, Mine, I got it, Get Out are all sufficient commands that Kepler shouts to take charge. Kirilloff is going to keep after the ball unless a command is given. If Kirilloff is calling for it, it is Kepler's job to call him off and then it is Kirilloff's job to get out of the way to let the player coming in on the ball with an easier play make the catch. I don't know if Kirilloff wasn't listening to Kepler or if Kepler just let him handle it. But... I do know that there was 7 people in the stands so crowd noise shouldn't have been an issue and I do know that it cost us a run late in a close game. Unless I hear different... that was a lazy play by Kepler.

I saw the LHP in my head.

His defense hasn't been good but the Twins seem committed to playing him at 2B. I assume in the hope that he gets better at it and he settles in as a decent defensive 2B down the road. They seem to be committed to that. No such commitment against left handed pitching.

Julien is not a good 2B. Julien is a very good hitter. He might be the best hitter on the team. We need good hitters. If the Twins send down what might be the best hitter we have on the roster. They will demonstrate for all that they are not very serious about fixing the offensive issues. Play him at whatever spot gets his bat into this lineup. If it's multiple spots... it's multiple spots.

Your point is solid. The only difference is that Buxton will be back next year. Gallo and Kepler most likely won't be and that makes getting rid of them... justifiable.

If anything... the Twins would do the opposite and save some cash. With that said... There has to be some current metrics saying that it's ok to move him down in the order. Along with other current metrics saying that there are no logical choices to move up in the order. 😁

PA's are indeed an indicator of ability along with health because being healthy also has value even in it's unpredictableness. Or... in the case of Kepler... PA's are an indicator of... I don't know... payroll? being a nice guy from Germany? 😁 I understood your approach and give you deserved respect for it. I've been singing the opportunity song for years. If there is one thing that will drive me absolutely crazy... it's sub-par performance getting opportunity after opportunity. Personally, I like teams that clear the fences because like you said... that 3 run homer is a nice crooked number. Why make 10 trips to the car to take the groceries in when you can bring them all in at once... but... I prefer the not making of outs over all and I hope to take the field with a team that is balanced. Our Twins just ain't balanced. The 2023 average OBP across baseball is .320. If you sort the Twins by Plate Appearances. 7 out of our top 9 have below league average OBP. It's quite possible that we are playing the wrong people. I say that without knowing who the right people are. In the context of the 2023 Twins. I'm willing to cut Gallo for a player who will bring a .321 OBP to the yard with him. 😀

Good Post I understand everything you are saying and I'm happy to take your contextual agreement and put in my pocket. My number was rudimentary to just make a statement that this team really need some hitters who are more Arraez-ish and less Gallo-ish and you understood that. I won't argue your numbers with one exception. You can't give Gallo the same number of opportunities that Arraez got. 😉 There is a reason that Arraez averaged 3.72 PA's over 162 games and Gallo only averaged 2.53. Dare I say that player value is a pretty good explanation that there is such a disparity in PA's per 162 games.

In this lineup? IMO... No... they are not equally valuable. We have plenty of players who hit home runs and strikeout a lot in THIS lineup. We need some players who can keep the line moving if we ever start a line. Gallo is much more valuable with Arraez type players surrounding him. Without players like Arraez surrounding him... Gallo is just the clown with the most makeup. Taking Gallo's current 2023 numbers after 92 games. If he remains at the current pace... Gallo will finish with about 67 hits. Arraez had 173 hits in 2022. That is 106 more hits keeping the line moving. Arraez would be 2.5 times more valuable to this lineup.

No it does not and actually the 0-18 doesn't even get close to suggesting that they are clearly weaker. The first loss in that 0-18 was game two of the 2004 American league divisional series against the Yankees. The 18th loss of that 0-18 was game two of the 2020 wild card series against the Astros. There wasn't a single player on the 2004 team that was on the 2020 team so loss #1 clearly has nothing to do with loss #18. Even if the same players were involved... the opponents teams were different year to year, month to month, week to week, game to game. Once you dive into the beginnings, the middle and the end of the 0-18 streak to find common players you start to realize that even the players that were part of this for multiple years are still different as individuals from year to year, month to month, week to week, game to game. Joe Mauer was a .432 OPS over 11 AB's in 2006 and a 1,000 OPS over 12 AB's in 2009 and a .558 in 2010 over 12 AB's. If you told me that you knew how Joe Mauer was going to perform in those 12 AB's in the 2006, 2009, 2010 playoffs after regular season OPS totals of .936, 1,031 and .871 in those years. I would have told you that you are... amazing. 😉 However... if you really want to impress me... you'd have my ear if you would have told me that Orlando Hudson was going to lead the Twins in 2010 with a .917 OPS over 12 AB's after a .701 OPS during the regular season. Now I realize that you are not talking about individual players... you are talking about teams being clearly better than the Twins. Regardless... my point about individual players in a small sample size still stands because individual performances are reason for the ream result. Good luck predicting 12 AB's for each individual player based upon... well I really don't know what you are going to base these predictions on. To bring this point home. It's about 60 playoff AB's for an every day player to get all the way through the playoffs. I've been pretty hard on Max Kepler. I don't think he should be on the roster. However, Max has hit 5 home runs in his past 62 AB's. If he did this during the playoffs... we would be singing songs about him. I don't know... you don't know... Max doesn't know... what he will do in the 2023 playoffs. However... lets talk about the teams since that is what you seem to be talking about. In 2019... you say that the 101 win Twins were "way weaker" compared to the the 103 win Yankees. You say the Twins were 5 games under .500 against teams with a winning record and claiming we got fat against the weak AL Central. The implication of your statement is that the Twins beat the weak teams while the Yankees beat the good teams. OK... Let's say that's true. If the Yankees won 103 by beating the GOOD teams and the Twins won 101 by beating the WEAK teams. The win total difference between 103 and 101 has to be made up somewhere so if you are correct... it would also HAVE TO MEAN that the Yankees LOST to the WEAK teams to make up the win/loss difference. No penalty for losing to the weak teams? Just in case the above point isn't getting anywhere... it should but just in case it isn't... I'll post the 2019 head to head records and you can tell me what team "clearly" dominated the Twins during the 2019 regular season. Opponent (Games) Won Lost WP Atlanta Braves (3) 1 2 0.333 Baltimore Orioles (6) 6 0 1.000 Boston Red Sox (6) 3 3 0.500 Chicago White Sox (19) 13 6 0.684 Cleveland Guardians (19) 9 10 0.474 Detroit Tigers (19) 14 5 0.737 Houston Astros (7) 4 3 0.571 Kansas City Royals (19) 14 5 0.737 Los Angeles Angels (6) 5 1 0.833 Miami Marlins (3) 2 1 0.667 Milwaukee Brewers (4) 2 2 0.500 New York Mets (4) 1 3 0.250 New York Yankees (6) 2 4 0.333 Oakland Athletics (7) 3 4 0.429 Philadelphia Phillies (3) 1 2 0.333 Seattle Mariners (7) 5 2 0.714 Tampa Bay Rays (7) 5 2 0.714 Texas Rangers (7) 6 1 0.857 Toronto Blue Jays (7) 4 3 0.571 Washington Nationals (3) 1 2 0.333 Let's continue on... deeper into the 2019 playoffs. We lost... the Yankees advance. They didn't get past the Astros and the Astros lost to the Nationals who were 6 games below .500 in Mid-June. Bottom Line: The playoffs are a small sample size, the 0-18 streak is a small sample size followed by a small sample size. It still hurts nonetheless but the streak was yesterday. Tomorrow is indeed a new day. We are right now 0-0 in future playoffs. I think we should add offense at the trade deadline. There are some who think we should sell. I think we should add offense because it helps us MAKE the playoffs not because the additions are going to necessarily help us win in the small sample size of the playoffs. Hopefully the additions improve our chances in the playoffs but I want to add to help us make the playoffs. For those who think we should sell... I can respect the reasoning that the team could sell Sonny Gray, get some decent players in return for the future, still make the playoffs and could still do well in the playoffs. I can't argue that point... I disagree because I think we should add offense but I can't argue that point. But for those who think we should sell because they think this team has NO CHANCE in the playoffs. I can't respect that. I won't respect that. I don't know, you don't know, the front office doesn't know and the individual players don't know. If you could tell me how Joe Mauer was going to perform in the playoffs in 2006, 2009 and 2010... Maybe I'll listen.

Yep... great post. We don't have to trade Brooks Lee to improve THIS offense. Basically... this offense can improve through simple subtraction. If we acquire a .230 hitter we have improved the offense... not by leaps and bounds but improvement nonetheless.

The Astros had 5 hitters last year Alvarez 187 Altuve 160 Bregman 133 Tucker 128 Brantley 125 In the playoffs Jose Altuve had an OPS of .483 over 58 playoff at-bats. It was Jeremy Pena who had a 1.005 OPS over 58 playoff at-bats who led the way to a title. Pena Regular Season OPS+ was 101. It was Yuli Gurriel who had an OPS of .850 during the playoff run over 49 AB's. which followed a regular season with an OPS+ of 84. I'll let others keep looking at regular season performance and think it matters come playoff time.

Excellent post. It describes what I am thinking. Is Kepler refusing to play CF or would he simply rather play RF? An agent speaking on behalf of the best interest of his client seems like normal course of agent business to me but it doesn't have to mean that Lewis is making demands to stay out of the OF and it certainly doesn't mean that the front office is trying to make Boras happy. The Twins organization might not want Lewis or Kepler in CF and therefore haven't asked. Royce may be saying to the powers that be... Man... I'll play anywhere as long as I get to play. Either way... I've read this stuff enough of this stuff to believe that a narrative of player obstinance is becoming perception.

They don't have to state it publicly. It's out there. Let's say the Twins trade for Nolan Arenado. Does the agent of Royce Lewis than say my client would rather ride the bench than play OF? Royce Lewis has 135 major league AB's. Royce Lewis will not be a free agent until 2029. Max Kepler is a couple of months from signing a minor league contract. I must be getting old but back in my day... People actually accomplished stuff before they were honored.

I'm not even sure if we are in disagreement with each other. However for the sake of the discussion. You can't have it both ways... You can't say that it isn't an exact science (I agree) and also say that these guys know what they are doing (I also agree) and then make up this unidentified super hero called Hole Man to make your point. 😁 I'm not trying to be obtuse. I understand that there are some very knowledgeable baseball people around those diamonds. I'm sure they have a fancy VCR or two that can slow down video for a better look at things. I'm saying that you can't miss on Nick Anderson and then tell me... OK... yeah but this other guy... we know. I'm saying... This other guy... this hole man guy... I don't want him up. I'm really saying that you can't shove Keplers and Gallos down my throat and expect me to think... yeah... they got this down.

I'd love to have that conversation with a pro scout. I would absolutely listen intently and remember everything said but... those words will just be details in the process that gets me to the same place that I already am. "Not anywhere near an exact science" is exactly where I am right now and that is the point that I am making. My point isn't "blind guessing". or "semi-educated darts".

I'm that guy. I come by it honestly. Mainly it's having very little tolerance for under performance such as Kepler, Pagan and Logan Morrison types. There is way too much competition for spots in the sport of baseball to justify the amount of rope that they are getting. I know nothing about Chris Williams other than... I'm pretty sure that he won't get a 40 man roster spot no matter what he does. Could it be worse? Absolutely it can be worse... but we shouldn't be looking for worse. We are looking for better but you can't look for better if you are letting the worry about worse stop you. If they are worse... throw them back from where they came and try door number 3. It's a more sensible step than holding firm with terrible. Bottom line... if we don't have players who can out perform Kepler. We have a development and player acquisition nightmare on our hands. I simply don't trust the front office or any front office nor do I trust myself to consistently predict who will succeed or who will not. So yeah... I'm that guy... and I come by it honestly.

Real Estate is also cheap in West Virginia and very expensive in Manhattan. Where you live is where you live. 😎

There is no doubt that some players get chance after chance while others get no chance. Your explanation is probable and I have no doubt that front offices have more exposure, tools and therefore knowledge than I do. They are making educated guesses. However... Those educated guesses have given us the retention of Max Kepler and Emilio Pagan, the signing of Joey Gallo, and the giving away of Nick Anderson among other visible mistakes. They have been spectacularly wrong and therefore my confidence in their abilities to make the correct decision based on the information available to them has eroded appropriately. I'm not just picking on our front office. Pick a team. The mistakes are visible. The Angels: Mickey Moniak has 130 AB's... 11th on the team in AB's with a .984 OPS. He didn't make the team out of spring training. He still had to wait his turn. The Angels couldn't see it with all those spray charts and exit velo data to guide them in their decision making. As I watch a video of Chris Williams going oppo taco in AAA... I can't help but wonder... why does he get No chance... and why does Max Kepler get chance after chance? It has to be that information that we are not privy to.

Paying good money to a player playing bad is a mistake but a mistake that doesn't have to be fatal. Playing that player over and over again is doubling down on that mistake and that is the part that kills you. Since they have already double downed. The quote from Falvey appears to be a tripling down. Derek Falvey on the possibility of trading for offense: "I still believe the vast majority of the offense we'll get the remainder of the season is going to come from the guys in that room. It's not going to be via acquisition that's going to make the primary difference." They are standing behind their product. Companies that do that usually offer a warranty.

It shouldn't be as expensive as trying to acquire starting pitching like we did last year.