ThejacKmp

Yeah. Tonkin got squeezed on that Braun at bat where he eventually walked him too. And to not be one-sided or biased, Sano's 4th ball on a 3-0 count was one of the most criminal calls I've ever seen. It wasn't even borderline, it was just a strike.* My wife who thinks baseball is as interesting as golf (hint: not interesting) was watching for once and she laughed out loud when it was called a ball. Insane in the membrane. * Loving the new/old Arcia but he immediately swung at the first pitch after a reliever came in and walked the bases loaded with an ump who clearly had a schizophrenic strike zone in calling a 4 pitch walk. C'mon man, take that first pitch!

1) You can disagree with where I draw the line but you can't call it arbitrary. Arbitrary is when you do something with no reason, just picking a random date as the dividing point. For example, the All-Star Break is an arbitrary dividing line. By contrast, I looked at the day-to-day stats and identified the date where I saw his OBP start to trend down. That's a reasoned dividing line. The logic and method may or may not be flawed but it is not arbitrary. 2) You are totally fine to connect seasons and thus talk about 400 PAs. You’ll notice that even though many of us don’t agree with connecting the two seasons in the way you do, we’ve been willing to discuss it and contextualize it from your frame of reference. By the same token, you need to understand the arguments on the other side about not connecting seasons and be willing to see why people say 58 PA = SSS and how that’s a valid point. I can’t believe that you can’t at least wrap your head around the idea that a new season is a new start and is worth considering as a new dividing point (e.g. we’re not adding in Mauer’s second half to his hot start this year to minimize it because this is a new season and we can see that maybe some things changed for him health-wise in the offseason). Can you come that far? No need to agree but also no need to be incredulous. 3) Also, if you’re going to connect the two seasons, you need to address the 1000+ PAs before that. Unless you can present some evidence as to why things changed 400/320 PAs ago (he’s getting different pitches, shifts became more prevalent, he went on the DL, his GF dumped him), then it’s hard for people to accept that those 400/320 PAs tell the real and complete story rather than just one part of the story which may or may not be true.

Agreed. There are no stats to back it up and its entirely subjective but I have seen insane strike zones for both the Twins and their opponents in a bunch of games. Hopefully the umps will settle down a bit? :-)

Its not a natural division, it's a completely arbitrary division. Brian Dozier wasn't a different guy after the All-Star Break (especially since he didn't get a break). My line picks "where did Brian Dozier start to struggle?" and it is relevant. 320 PAs is less convincing than 400 because it is a smaller sample. People are saying 58 PA because they are refusing to go along with your connection of this year to last year. This is a brand new season and has a very small sample. Dozier was worn down last year and I (and others) think that its disingenuous to pretend that there was no break in the middle; thus, when we say 58 we mean "Hey, this is a brand new season and it's a very small sample this year so let's exercise some patience and avoid the kneejerk pessimism." You can certainly disagree but using words like hate and attacking Brock on a somewhat personal level seems like overkill. It might be time to take a step back. I've been there before too - you think you're right and you want to fight anyone who disagrees. That's why I have my warning point :-)

And those 400 PAs (which are really like 320) don't change the 1000 PAs before that. Brian Dozier is not Chris Parmalee - he has earned some leeway with his past performance because we have two years of evidence of his wild successes. He doesn't have the years of leeway Mauer has (as much as people have loved to rag on Mauer, you don't see threads about how this year is a mirage because Mauer's past makes this hot streak seem like a return to the norm rather than aberration) but he has enough to outlast 320 ABs over two seasons or 58 ABs this season. You can't just focus on your 400/320 PAs and ignore the years before it. Your 400/320 PAs are definitely a concern and Brock and others have never denied that it's not been good. We're just asking you to remember the 1000 before that and understand that this hasn't hit the level of statistically relevant. As Brock said, if we hit end of May, mid-June and he's still at .600 OPS, then we start to worry and perhaps think about other options.

I don't know about other people but based on the arguments Dozier-defenders are making, I can't think that they are the people calling Buxton a flop - I bet they're in there yelling "SSS" and "rushed to the majors". And the Dozier-attackers would be consistent if they were attacking both. So I don't see any dichotomy in excuse-making As a DD, I'll say that I believe Buxton will have a great second half and am not at all worried about his slow start to his career. We have a small sample and he is super young. Calling him a flop is criminally misguided. While I don't agree with the DAs and think we're very premature in panicking to the "trade/bench Dozier" levels some advocate, that's a much more solid argument than the Buxton pessimists. Don't see the correlation and don't think the two things are the same argument. Have to disagree with you.

Categorically and basely untrue. Erroneous. I cannot condemn this statement enough. Even though I have before. See below (I keep this in a document on my desktop because the misconception about Brian Dozier’s second half is so pervasive): ------ What is interesting about this is not that Dozier had a bad second half of 2015 but that everyone thinks he had a bad one the year before. His splits before and after the break in 2014: AVG/OBP/SLG/OPS .242/.340/.436/.776 .244/.352/.387/.739 There's a slight fall off in slugging but an increase in OBP. Overall this is not much of a drop off. The narrative is almost entirely driven by the differences in his home runs, which we focus on too much. Dozier had 18 HR in the first half of 2014 vs. 5 HR in the second half but also had 16 doubles and no triples vs 17 doubles and one triple. As the first half has 100 more at bats than the second half, the real story is a little less pop with some home runs turning into doubles. This myth of Dozier falling apart in the second half of 2014 colors the way we look at Dozier as a player. He slumped late in 2015 but we certainly shouldn’t be building patterns out of one season and the mistaken impression of another season. He played every day through injury - the issue is the Twins not giving him a day off, not some failure to finish seasons. If you want another reason to disregard the Dozier second half struggle narrative, here are his first and second half splits in 2013: AVG/OBP/SLG/OPS .235/.310/.386/.696 .253/.313/.443/.757 So please, for the love of Sano, the next time you see someone on Twins Daily or IRL talk about how Dozier always fades in the second half, introduce them to this funny thing called statistics. We can do better than rehashing the tired plotlines of the FSN broadcast.

All I'm saying is that you can't say four consecutive months. Those months are not in fact consecutive by any definition of the word consecutive. Other than that, all I'm asking for is some patience. No one is saying an injury definitely caused last year but in the absence of any other theory (he's getting similar pitches in similar areas so that's not it) and the caveat that the Twins' lack of 2B depth led them to play him every single day down the stretch even as he struggled, it's the most reasonable I've seen advanced thus far. He hit in spring training and now we have a small sample from this year where he was not particularly good. Also, 400 AB is a bit overstating his slump. He had an .850 OPS as late as Jul 19 last year. That's a rather arbitrary place to start cutting things off but BR's game logs are really useful in showing stats day by day. July 21 is really where you start seeing a steady decline in his OPS with very little of the seesawing up and down of the first three weeks of July (when his OPS was a stellar .746). So a better cutoff spot for "Dozier's Slump". That's 270 ABs in 2015 plus the 50 this year. That's 320 not 400. Now that's not a small number and this thread clearly shows there are reasons to pay attention to Dozier but a half season does not a pattern make - especially since at this point in 2015 he was hitting .192/.271/.327. He started slow last year before taking off on his way to the All-Star game and it could very well be the same in 2016. Patience young grasshopper, patience.

I was very happy to see Molitor PH for Murphy yesterday and then stick Suzuki back there. Only two of Park/Sano/Rosario/Arcia are going to get to play today (my votes are Arcia vs. a righty and Sano because he's Sano) but at least we will have two very fun bats on the bench in Park and Rosario that might actually be used in a meaningful situation for a poor hitter. And that's not even mentioning hitting for pitchers!*

But if you're trying to make a SSS not-so-small by connecting it to last year, you'd have to also explain spring training. You could try with "pitchers are new" or "they don't use scouting reports" but that only holds so much water when a guy is doing well against ML pitching in spring training. And that ignores how dubious it is to connect months that took place six months apart. Injuries fade, guys have more energy, there are new starting pitchers to face - it's all very different.

Are there numbers to back up this claim? I took a look on fangraphs and these are the % of pitches up Dozier saw the last three years: 2014 22.6% 2015 22.3% 2016 21.7% Pretty much no change on pitches up. If you just want to go up and in: 2014 7.0% (15.6% if you include middle up) 2015 5.2% (13.5% if you include middle up) 2016 5.7% (13.6% if you include middle up) There’s a bit of a dip from 2014 to 2015/2016 on pitches up and in but I’m not sure that’s its big enough to provide a reasonable explanation for what’s happening (or to explain how he was so hot beginning of 2015). I tend to go more for “he was banged up from playing every day last year” and this year he’s just hitting under pitches a little more often. That should even itself out and screams SSS.

You can't call months consecutive if they happen six months apart. The baseball season does not exist on a permanent loop, as much as we might like it to.

I've said it before, I'll say it again. The "Brian Dozier had a bad second half the past two years" narrative is as tiresome as it is incorrect. He did not fall off in the second half of 2014 in any meaningful way and had a second half every bit as good as the first half. He has one and only one year with a second half fade (last year, when he was banged up). One year does not a pattern make. Let's all agree to kill this talk whenever it starts.

Yeah but the last 13 games took place a full 6 months after the first part and he was banged up the end of last year. I certainly don't enjoy watching Dozier not hit well but I think it's way too early to be worried. He could use a bit of a drop in the lineup perhaps.

That is true - though O'Rourke is so bad against righties and so good against lefties that any righty bat might become comparable.

K, we'll ignore the hitters - though it's hard to see how an organization would hold different policies for youth and hitters and pitchers. And we'll have to disagree on approach a bit too - I think it's perfectly acceptable to start guys in low-leverage scenarios and then move them into more difficult scenarios as they show success. Trevor May was handled in that way and it worked well. But I get you disagree and want guys given a chance to prove themselves in close ballgames. I guess I just don't see the evidence yet. Tonkin isn't a good example since he was terrible in his prior stints. Rogers was an injury replacement three weeks into becoming a reliever so that's hard to see either. JR Graham was a Rule 5 pickup and those are notoriously overmatched guys a team is later hoping to get into the minors and work on. And Trevor May is an example of a guy who started in lower-leverage situations and quickly moved into a late inning role so he's evidence against your point. I think the reason for this lack of evidence is that the Twins just haven't had a lot of real good young relievers coming up the past few years. It's not like they're losing good young relievers, they just haven't had them. That's due to some bad drafting, some bad luck with injury and a regrettable tendency to hold onto guys (Dean, Rogers) as starters far too long (Hendricks is another example of that - if they'd moved him to reliever earlier perhaps he would not have been released as a failed starting prospect and would be anchoring this bullpen). I just don't see a body of evidence that shows the Twins not giving deserving young guys a chance to prove themselves. But again, we shall see with Tonkin/Pressley/Fien. It may take 2-3 weeks but I think we'll see the former getting more opportunity and the latter less (if trends continue of course).

And again, my response that trust/opportunities are earned not given. Tonkin has yet to earn any trust in the majors, he was far worse than Stinky Ol' Fien every chance he got. Hopefully the combination of better results and a golden opportunity will change that this year but I can't blame the Twins for the way they've used Tonkin the last few years - he's just looked bad at the major league level. It takes some guys a little while - they showed some faith in him this year by not cutting him so clearly they always had some concept he had what it took if he could just put it together. The Twins have regularly given young guys like Rosario, Buxton, Sano and Santana tons of opportunities. Unless this is only a bullpen thing, I don't see causation. The Twins have used young guys, they just don't give them an endless line to hang themselves with. Results = trust = opportunity.

See what I replied to Stringer Bell below since it addressed some of this. Opportunities are somewhat random but Tonkin took advantage and until we see the Twins ignore it, let's not assume it will happen. The Twins aren't going to drop Casey Fien overnight but the pendulum is moving. Fien does stink of late and he hasn't looked good this year or most of last year. He's on a reasonable one-year deal and if the Twins were willing to move on from Stauffer last year, I don't see why they wouldn't be willing to demote Fien from the late innings (and eventually drop him entirely if young guys in the minors look ready*). I guess I'm just unwilling to say that the Twins won't give Tonkin a chance til we see what they do. * What are the odds that Fien is on the Twins June 1? August 1? I'd go 60/40 on June 1 but 40/60 or lower on August 1. He's not the worst ever but the Twins will have better options and Fien always has a two week stinker in him. In years past the Twins didn't have amazing options to replace him during those times but that won't be true this year (knock on wood).

Agreed on getting too excited about Tonkin from a small sample but man, what a sample. He's also always been a guy who didn't seem to be confident out there so hopefully this can trigger confidence. Some of it is random opportunity but that's the way of life. Up until this week, the Twins had three late-inning guys who had earned their roles (May, Jepsen and Perkins) which meant that Tonkin was competing with Pressley, Fien and Abad for middle inning scraps. That's changed now as Tonkin has a golden opportunity. That difference is striking when it comes to JR Graham. You were right that he did pitch well that game and that he did ten wait ten days to pitch again. That said, he was also less than a week removed from getting shelled for five runs in two innings, was a Rule V guy only on the roster to preserve the Twins rights to him and had not had much success all season. Thus, there was a larger body of work that came into effect that is different than Tonkin. Tonkin has proved himself in the minors, has the opportunity with Perkins on the DL/Fien struggling and has been good all year so I imagine he'll get more of a shot to prove it wasn't a fluke. I guess we shall see. P.S. I'm also very excited about Ryan Pressley. He has looked really solid thus far. Not as much of a back-of-the-pen guy as Tonkin could be with the K rate but he seems like a steady middle reliever. More Pressley, less Fien!

Agreed on getting too excited about Tonkin from a small sample but man, what a sample. He's also always been a guy who didn't seem to be confident out there so hopefully this can trigger confidence. Some of it is random opportunity but that's the way of life. Up until this week, the Twins had three late-inning guys who had earned their roles (May, Jepsen and Perkins) which meant that Tonkin was competing with Pressley, Fien and Abad for middle inning scraps. That's changed now as Tonkin has a golden opportunity. That difference is striking when it comes to JR Graham. You were right that he did pitch well that game and that he did ten wait ten days to pitch again. That said, he was also less than a week removed from getting shelled for five runs in two innings, was a Rule V guy only on the roster to preserve the Twins rights to him and had not had much success all season. Thus, there was a larger body of work that came into effect that is different than Tonkin. Tonkin has proved himself in the minors, has the opportunity with Perkins on the DL/Fien struggling and has been good all year so I imagine he'll get more of a shot to prove it wasn't a fluke. I guess we shall see. P.S. I'm also very excited about Ryan Pressley. He has looked really solid thus far. Not as much of a back-of-the-pen guy as Tonkin could be with the K rate but he seems like a steady middle reliever. More Pressley, less Fien!

I hate to give my parents credit for anything but eons ago when I was in high school, they always emphasized that trust was earned and not automatically granted. I don’t think it’s the worst policy to throw guys into low-leverage situations when they come up and then increase their responsibility as they show able to the task. Tonkin consistently looked terrible in low leverage situations the past few years and he never earned that trust – why would you put a guy in high-leverage situations (in a contending season) when he can’t handle the low-leverage ones? This year, he has been given increasingly important opportunities and has excelled. I think it’s premature to assume that Molitor hasn’t noticed that or to think that Tonkin hasn’t earned himself new opportunities. As to Taylor Rogers, I think it’s important to note that it isn’t like he pitched so well in the minors that they were forced to bring him up (and thus he should get a more prominent role). He was an injury replacement and as such, was the last man in the pen. The Twins were in tight games the entire week so it’s not like they were throwing May out there in a 7-2 game where Rogers would be better served getting a shot. He did well enough in his short opportunity to make the Twins confident they could use him again if and when they need to. That said, he was the last guy in the pen getting a week or two to taste the big leagues so not being used much isn’t a calamity. The larger point is that the Twins have guys like Jepsen and May who have earned leeway and trust – they could be bad for a month and the Twins would stick with them. Guys like Fien and Abad have some past success but also have much shorter leashes. I don’t think anyone would be surprised if Tonkin and Fien have switched roles in a few weeks if Fien continues to struggle and Tonkin keeps striking out the Mike Trouts of this world. And if Chargois or Burdi is ready at that point, Fien would be the one moving on and the new guy would be the one trying to earn that trust. It’s a reasonable way to bring up young relievers and I don’t think Tonkin or Rogers highlight any issue – if anything, Tonkin developing perhaps highlights the benefits of bringing guys along slowly with increasing opportunity as it is earned.

Agreed, especially because the other team can just pinch hit a righty and then O'Rourke is not in an ideal position. That said, I don't think having Rogers or O'Rourke effects Tonkin. They fulfill different roles no matter what and if Tonkin keeps it up, he'll continue to get more chances.

I am intrigued why O'Rourke stayed up and not Rogers since the Twins have more of a need for a long man than a LOOGY and Rogers is intriguing there. The Twins have four right handed starters and it's always nice to be able to bring in an opposite-handed long reliever - other teams have set their lineups to face a righty and that can help a lefty stem the bleeding and give the hitters a chance to make a game of it.

I mean, it's April 19th. If they're not promoting guys in May or June that's when we can start being upset. Complaining about it now is premature and a bit pessimistic. I've been encouraged to see Pressly and Tonkin getting some meaningful moments in games and think that's a good harbinger of things to come.

Not to quibble because Mike Pelfrey is the definition of a borderline 5th starter but last year he actually had a pretty good start of the year. It was the ending that was his issue.