ashbury

Timberwolves executives would just like to remind fans that pre-season is only a few weeks away now, and that they have the talent and coaching to break your hearts too.

Jax used up his rookie eligibility last year. If we're talking about a pipeline, that was last year's delivery. I don't want to keep counting the same guys. Ryan not only was major league ready when he was acquired, but IMO the process of dealing away assets during a bad season should not count toward any concept of a pipeline. I want good seasons. I want the model of sustainable success that the new FO talked about in 2016. Simeon Woods Richardson will get the same critique if and when he makes it to the majors - all well and good to acquire him, and kudos for finishing developing him, but it came about because we weren't competitive at a trade deadline so it doesn't count as a validation of a pipeline. Off-season trades that are constructive are OK by me, as a way of replenishing the pipeline. Ronny Henriquez counts as the pipeline, for me. If we ever have off-season tanking, then no, such trades wouldn't.

I already feel bad that my bit of humor could be misinterpreted as mocking the poster, so let me say: it doesn't take analytics at all, to demonstrate that this team has stunk for months now. The won-loss record alone is enough.

I don't believe the talent level between AAA and most major leaguers is as vast as that. Today's game was against KC pitchers who each came into the game with an ERA above 5. (One left after having lowered it below that lofty threshold.) They aren't much more than AAA themselves. Don't you think a good game between AAA teams ought to result in more than 2 base hits? Some people need to be playing as though they would like a major league contract next season, if not from the Twins then someone after they are cut loose. I'm not seeing much of that based on results. The players, the coaching staff, everyone ought to feel ashamed.

That's some fine analytics work there, Lou.

Two freaking hits, versus a bunch of pitchers who came into the game with ERAs over 5. Don't tell me about injuries. Our AAA lineup should at least be able to compete against that. Arraez and Correa with base hits. Nobody else. You know what I call that? Lollygagging. So then what does that make our hitters today?

Also a neat trick, if you want the actual actor who portrayed him.

Why stop there? Always wondered if Ron Davis would have made a dandy anchor to any starting rotation. Why neither the Yankees nor Twins had the foresight to give that idea a whirl is beyond me. But the fact they didn't only strengthens the case. I've also always wondered what would have happened if Sir Barton and Babe Ruth had traded places. Could a horseracing AND baseball Triple Crown have been achieved? Pretty sure yes. How can a horse know unless he tries?

I'm starting to lose faith in our chances of winning the Central.

When I talk about FO analytics and their tolerance for risk. this is a central question to ponder, and I'm glad you've raised it. Signing Buxton long-term was nearly a marketing necessity, and nobody with P&L responsibility can ignore that. So IMO Buxton's a given. How do you deal with injury risk, with that as a given? Apparently our FO has chosen to construct a starting pitching staff with injury risk intentionally built in and accepted, in pursuit of maximum upside for the dollar. They traded for Gray, who hasn't been a workhorse in some time and a downward trajectory in IP looks in progress. They signed two free agents in Archer and Bundy who everyone expected would be on limited workloads, and yet both have had time on the IL and both are likely to pitch 145 innings or less. And the two big trades, well, that has been discussed to death, about the red flags that were knowable by even fans who look at IL logs before the trades were consummated. Outfield and pitching staff are very nearly separate decisions. And yet, I believe a different FO, or at least one with a different analytics team to advise them, could choose different approaches, given that "given" about Buxton. If OF will be iffy, maybe the strategy is a more solid starting staff, at whatever cost that may involve.

Either it will rain tomorrow, or it won't. Everything's 50/50. I continue to believe that some teams have better analytics than 50/50, where it comes to projecting player durability, and that our Twins lag the field in it.

LOL, my bad. Activated from, versus placed on.

Who had 2 concussion IL additions on the same day, on their Twins 2022 bingo card?

So apparently Rocco is using both too much analytics and too little.

If benching Cave against a left handed starter is analytics, then they've been doing analytics in baseball for more than a century now.

Yeah, that was kind of my point, although I don't see Kepler moving the needle even in a 5:1 trade.

No matter how much coaching he gets, those errors at Elizabethton and Cedar Rapids are never going away. He showed improvement in this stat at Wichita and St Paul this year. If 22 errors is your metric for defense, he'll be 30 years old before that stigma gets wiped away from his totals. His range factor per nine innings looks a bit low to me, but runners at AAA were challenging his arm and getting thrown out often enough to almost offset that. If his bat is legit I can live with slightly subpar defense at a corner.

Wouldn't we all. Any candidate teams in mind, who are looking to unload a pitching stud in return for an average-ish right fielder who isn't underpaid?

How to define the season? A roster constructed full of known injury risks, or at least needing to plan a reduced load around. Then when injuries occur?

Concise.

Pushback from a couple of people on my take, and looking narrowly at the deadline (which indeed was the topic of the article), I can't disagree. I think my view was stated in a bigger-picture way, toward roster construction during the off-season, but I didn't flesh it out. Basically, I was lukewarm on getting a non-ironman like Sonny Gray, at least in exchange for our top draft choice (a pitcher, at that), and was skeptical about Mahle given the recent shoulder woes (a red flag for any pitcher). But those two trade with the Red give us a good idea, in the rear view mirror, of what prospects of ours they were interested in, and how they valued them. WHAT IF (that useless phrase) those considerable assets had been applied to getting Castillo, last off-season? Even though he was coming off a down season, I think I'd have liked him better than either of the two we got, and we might not have had to add a Royce Lewis type of player to a package headlined by Petty, Steer, CES and Hajjar. Pitching is the coin of the realm and that is two good arms in the package, plus a middle infielder and a potent bat, and that should have been appealing for the best pitcher of the three starters Cincy was shopping around. Going back to the deadline itself, the FO had put themselves in an arguably impossible position due to the roster they had constructed prior to the season. I didn't say much about the Mahle acquisition at the time, partly not to be raining on everyone's parade during the excitement of Having Done Something At The Deadline For Once. But partly because I was hoping against hope that our FO's professional analytics types had drawn out something better with their access to good data, than my amateur analytics approach of "steer clear of guys recently injured, unless the price is low." The price wasn't low.

I don't necessarily disagree about him, but do you have specific instances in mind where this trait shows up? Eh, even at that, on-field rah-rah may or may not carry over to the clubhouse, or for that matter result in improved play from teammates. I don't deny that clubhouse chemistry is important but how are fans really to know where it concerns a particular player?

Pagan wasn't the type I'd have been hoping to get back, and indeed he was a throw-in (a possible DFA candidate at that), so comparing the two isn't productive. But I was all for trading Rogers, who I thought to be an injury risk until he proves he isn't, as long as they had a plan for replacing his important role in the bullpen. They didn't do that, and compounded the error by trading for a player, in Paddack, who was a bigger injury risk (as the Mets later attested) than Rogers himself. That's what made it a bad trade. Not Pagan. As for the article itself, it sets up a false dilemma. The better option would have been to aim higher. Beat Seattle's offer for Castillo for instance. And we know from the Mahle trade what Cincy was interested in from us, so start from that and add something. (No, I don't know what, but it wouldn't have to involve Royce Lewis etc.) Prime talent will cost you, but going for second best is a false economy.

Diminish? Diminish?!? (You kidding me? I just hope we can win a game! Another game.)

Would that have been the case for the Twins, had he passed through waivers? I'm not up on the fine points of minor league veteran player rights.