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Dantes929

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Everything posted by Dantes929

  1. Dantes929
    When Dozier went off in the first half of 2015 we kept hearing how well he handled the up and in pitches as well as anyone in baseball and I kept wondering why he still got those pitches and what would happen if he did not. Well, the 2nd half of 2015 gave me the answer. We heard at the start of 2016 how he was working on plate coverage and going with the pitch which I considered a good thing but the transition was not so smooth and the first 75 games were pretty mediocre. Then the 2nd half of 2016 happened and his spray chart was much more impressive. Nothing wrong with being a pull hitter but there is a problem with trying to pull everything. Dozier seems to have adjusted into a really good hitter. Bottom line is there are very few 2nd basemen (or any position) that have hit 42 home runs. Since that is the last thing he has done, that is who he is right now. We dream of Sano hitting 40 homers and we dream of any 1st round draft pick hitting 40 homers. Well, Dozier actually did it and should be right in his prime. I get that maybe Uriah is off the table but to me the Twins should get DeLeon, Alvarez and Buehler. If they get less than DeLeon and Alvarez it is a fail.
  2. Dantes929
    Not only was the 2007 team a losing team but we were losing our Cy Young and our all star centerfielder and people asked how the Twins could possibly avoid losing lots more games in 2008 and the answer was for more guys to play better with respect to their abilities. Guys with low grades in 2007 whether due to injuries, mechanics or whatever were Mauer, Punto, Blackburn, Slowey and Baker that turned it around in 2008 with significant results in the record. The equivalent on this roster are Buxton, Escobar, Rosario, Gibson, Santiago, and May. Of course they have farther to go but guys simply playing up to their abilities or even having good seasons with respect to their abilities shouldn't be unexpected. Look at the grades! I don't think Nick was grading them with respect to a higher standard. If Gibson, Duffey, or Santiago had 3.5 ERA's they probably get A's. If they have 4.00 ERA's they get strong B's. They got D- and F's! They are capable of better.
  3. Dantes929
    I thought Santiago was judged a little harshly. 5 of his last 7 starts were pretty good to very good and he really wasn't with us all that long. I am not so sure Duffey was "figured out". To me he definitely didn't have the same command of his fast ball which he needed to complement his off speed stuff by which I mean all his various curve balls. His curve ball also didn't have the same bite or variations that we saw in 2015. I compared Duffey to Blyleven in 2015 and have no regrets. What made Blyleven special wasn't that he had the best fastball or even the best curveball. Rather it was that he had a decent fastball with good control and an above average curve ball with good control for 20+ years. Duffey had that in 2015. He did not have it in 2016. IMO, the results were less that batters figured him out and more that he did not execute the pitches as well.
  4. Dantes929
    I can cherry pick with the best of them but don't feel especially guilty here. You can include Dozier. Its not like Plouffe or Revere were fails or anything but I remember as the 2011 team regulars started dropping like flies we were replacing them with guys that were having very poor seasons in the minors without a whole lot of upside. Looking back on the prospect rankings by team I was surprised to see the Twins as high as 12 in 2011 and 20th in 2012. Of course there are going to be guys that develop into decent major leaguers but the outlook of a group ranked 12th with support of a group of guys ranked 20th is different than the outlook of a group ranked 1st supported by a group of guys ranked 15th (current ranking of system talent). Plus the prognosis for Dozier was decent at that time and now he is a 42 home run guy or will be turned into a similar asset. Of course all these guys can fail but I like watching guys develop rather than buying teams and if this group fails then I will wait for the next group.
  5. Dantes929
    i obviously have more patience than most. Five years ago the players that were promoted were lousy in the minors and the upside of Plouffe, Casilla, Revere, Hendriks, Wolters, etc are worlds different than how I view Sano, Polanco, Buxton, Kepler, May, Berrios and Chargois., etc. I view 2016 as growing pains and a transition to a better team. I don't like 103 losses but am not distressed by it as long as I see the potential in the young guys.
  6. Dantes929
    Dozier absolutely carried the team into contention in the first half of 2015 but I kept hearing how well he handled the high inside pitch and kept seeing how he was continuing to see high inside pitches. Like most hitters who are pull happy I did not think it could last and of course it did not. I thought his trade value was highest at the all star break that year. Then in 2016 I appreciated how he was trying to be a more complete hitter but the first half results were poor. Then the switch was turned on and the 2nd half of 2016 happened. My point is I am way more confident that the 2nd half 2016 is sustainable whereas the first half 2015 was not. As much as I like Polanco I do not believe he can carry a team offensively like Dozier has. If guys like Santana, Berrios, May can all perform well at the same time then we still need offense to produce and Dozier has been the best producer for us over the last two years. I think Dozier has become a very good hitter. I have often advocated the Twins consider exploring trading guys who were on hot streaks and thus selling high but the idea of selling high is that you actually get high as a return. DeLeon and Buehler should be the minimum of what we get. Any less would not be "selling high", imo. The flip side of not selling guys at their high point in the past was selling Johann Santana at his high point but not getting a high return. Who knows what would have happened if we had simply kept him. Would likely have meant a playoff spot and who knows what happens then.
  7. Dantes929
    If we get DeLeon I don't see why the next move would be to try to deal Santana. If DeLeon and Berrios are who we want them to be then that 3rd starter, Santana would be a very important piece in that rotation. Put May in the 4th spot and let the rest duke it out. Santana is well above the 50% for quality starts and I would not want to move him unless it is for a near ready prospect that has his potential. Probably in other words another DeLeon. If we let him go I can pretty much bank that we will want a guy like him during the season. He is a quality starting pitcher and we need more of those, not less. The old office would have given him an extension. Don;t do that but we have a good pitcher for 2 or 3 years and I see no reason to let him go at this point.
  8. Dantes929
    I thought of DYoung but 2010 happened and I don't think y a top 10 MVP vote getter should be put on the list. Rondell White was a big disappointment. What I didn't get was the criticism the Twins got from the hindsight crowd. It was a great signing. Sometimes good moves don't work out. I guess I still haven't seen anything that takes 0-17 WL record off the lead spot.
  9. Dantes929
    Ron Davis, Tommy Herr would be examples of guys who were successful pros but not successful Twins. I felt sorry for Davis. I disliked Herr. Terry Felton started 10 games, pitched in 55 games for the Twins and was 0-16. Kind of a tough one to beat even though his ERA wasn't even close to worst.
  10. Dantes929
    I don't hate that we haven't had an ace. I hate that in the last 6 years we have only had one year in which more than one of our top 5 or 6 starters according to Baseball Reference has had an ERA below 4.18. Gibson, Santana and Milone in 2015 were right around 4 and we competed until game 158 or so. Last year Santana was the only one below 5.00 ERA!!! Just think how nice it would be to have 5 starters at 4.00. Quick math guess on a rotation averaging 4.00 with an offense scoring around 4.5 will equal around 90 wins. I think the potential is there with Santana, May, Berrios, DeLeon (I know, we have to get him first) and Gibson/Santiago to have a rotation of around 4.00. Doesn't sound great but it would be.
  11. Dantes929
    I guess you would have to define B level prospects. Twins are starting pitching starved and people want to give up the only guy in the rotation with an ERA below 5. In fact, his ERA was over a run and a half better than anyone else's. No way in the world I give him up for B level prospects. I have not given up on the Twins competing next year. Get DeLeon, put May back into the rotations, hope Berrios lives up to his promise and we will compete. What is gained by getting rid of a guy with a 3.38 ERA unless you get something that you expect to be better than that in prospects.
  12. Dantes929
    I think middle of rotation guys are underrated here and the reason is that our middle of rotation guys have not pitched liked middle of rotation guys. Santana the last couple years has pitched more like a solid #2 and the problem is all the rest have pitched like back of rotation and not even good back of the rotation. Gibson had one year as a solid middle and May was certainly on track before being sent to the pen. A better year from Berrios and adding Deleon and I would say we had a decent potential of 5 guys with 4.5 ERA or better and in some cases significantly better. If that doesn't excite anyone just consider that we scored 4.4 runs a game and gave up 5.5 and that 4.5 on average is considered a quality start (6 innings and 3 runs).
  13. Dantes929
    Well, his last 4 months of the year were preposterous. I don't know why people think Dozier is so easily replaced. I would not give him up for less than two top 50. He has become more than a one dimensional hitter. As so often is the case he seemed to become a little less focused on hitting home runs and as a result, hit more home runs.
  14. Dantes929
    And Mauer had much better stats against righties while Vargas struggled with them. Certainly with an unlimited bench this would be a no brainer. Since that isn't the case it might not work out so great. It could work with Park also but he needs to show something in the minors first, imo. Last year was too muddied with Sano, Plouffe and Arcia in the discussion as well. I say this every year but it really bears repeating. ST should not be used to determine rosters in almost all cases. Vargas has earned a shot. Park has not.
  15. Dantes929
    I think Duensing had a spot start in one of those years. Baseball reference shows the top 5 or 6 as a sub category and those 3 were on that list all three of those years. Slowey and Blackburn were back of the rotation starters but they were very good back of the rotation starters and Baker was a solid tick above middle of rotation category, imo.
  16. Dantes929
    You mean three of the 5 starters on our 2008 game 163 team, 3 of the 5 starters on our division winning 2009 team and 3 of the 5 starters on our 2010 94 win division winning team?
  17. Dantes929
    From 2012-2015, he posted ERAs between 3.30 and 3.75. 5 of his last 7 starts were quality. He was mediocre in 2015 but the prior 3 years are certainly upper middle of rotation numbers. We have the payroll room, he may be a tradeable asset and I don't think there are 5 starters that are better than him. I really liked the perfection is the enemy of good quote. Its part of the reason we lost Liriano. He wasn't the ace some thought he could or should be so he was written off..
  18. Dantes929
    The bullpen and by that I mean the three guys that were supposed to be huge assets based on 2015 and instead were collectively way worse than replacement and then were gone or injured the rest of the season. No matter who we got for the pen we were still going to give the high leverage innings to Perkins, Jepsen and May. They totally blew 5 or 6 games very early in the season. I know that doesn't seem like it makes much difference on a 100 loss season but when young guys are pressing because of sucking and losing it certainly can plus guys that should have been big assets were not there. These guys were great in 2016 and totally blew in 2016.
  19. Dantes929
    I don't see them contending in 3 years. I see them contending the next 3 years. I think there is talent on this team and I expect talented players to play well. That was not the case last year. Berrios, Sano, Buxton and May playing well and others just playing better can make a profound difference. What's happening in 3 years that can't happen this year?
  20. Dantes929
    To be fair, I don't think Duffy had anywhere near the command of his fastball as he did the prior year and his curve ball did not have the same bite to it. i agree that switching places with May makes a lot of sense. I would be ok with Berrios, May, Santana, Santiago, Gibson. If Berrios is the real deal this feels like at least as good a rotation as the 2009 and 2010 division winning Twins.
  21. Dantes929
    This. He had an excellent minor league season in 2014 as a starter and conquered his control issues that he had in the past. You can write off his major league debut to nerves. As noted above he got off to a slow start in 2015 but then had 6 quality starts in his last 9 before being moved to the pen. He was arguably the best Twins starter at the time. His command, his variety of stuff and his health all scream rotation. I know it is cherry picking but his stats as a starter are skewed by his bad showing in 2014 and a slow start in 2015. He went from a 5.4 ERA in May to a 4.3 ERA at the end of June. IMO, he had settled in nicely and while I understood why they did it at the time I didn't like it. Still don't. We have other arms coming up that profile for the pen better anyway.
  22. Dantes929
    I can't imagine that they do not. If the Dozier did not play for the Twins then Twins fans would be salivating over him. Dozier had 17 more homers than Murphy. 27 more than Zimmerman. Because of the poor 2nd half last year and the horrible start this year it looked like Dozier was "figured out". His 2nd half laid waste to that idea. If we cannot get something this good or similar then we should not be trading him.
  23. Dantes929
    I don't care if the total payroll is 50 mil with Mauer making half of it. I like your blueprint. I would not like it if I didn't believe Sano, Buxton, Kepler, Rosario, Berrios, Duffey, Gibson and May could be better in 2017 than in 2016. I have always believed that just improving at each position even if it is without changing the roster can have a profound effect on the results. These are all guys we have been told are talented enough so that improvement is a reasonable expectation
  24. Dantes929
    Gibson, Duffey, May, Berrios, Sano. Notice 4 of them are pitchers. Sano just having better at bats in key situations would be a plus.
  25. Dantes929
    Quick check on velocity of the 20 best starter ERA's last season says 8 have fastballs below league average in velocity and at least 4 are decidedly so. Hendriks (1), Bumgarner (4), Tanaka (12) and Pomeranz (20). Of course that means 12 are slightly to significantly faster but I still think too much emphasis is on velocity unless you have one that is way up there.
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