ashbury

Change the strike zone definition. I already said that. 99% of fans would never notice the difference. The remaining 1% would be hard pressed to explain why old is better than new, or vice versa. Automating the strike zone might have a small helpful impact for batters (better predictability, while pitching is all about messing with that). If the strike zone becomes a 2-D construct, it maybe gives the talented pitcher a way to make a perfect pitch that will be unhittable that will be called a strike where it's currently not, removing a little of that batter-advantage. Anything that contributes to balance is okay in my book.

Enjoy your quaint 19-century game, where a 70-MPH pitch was pretty fast. Any sport being designed from the ground up, today, would include no features that involve something measurable but which leave the decisions to an opinion by a human that they try to train to make good guesses. Pro tennis is making the switchover away from line judges, for example, and no one thinks that game will be ruined.

This is accurate. But even in the absence of financial constraints, there's always the opportunity cost of a 40-man spot being taken if better opportunities are available. If he's signed after Spring Training begins, he can of course go straight to the 60-day IL and make room for that other player, while he goes through some kind of "rehab" regimen to be ready when an injury opens up a spot for him. Or if he's willing to sign here on a minor league contract - but I expect some desperate team will give him a guaranteed contract. If we have to carry him during the winter in favor of, say, one more Rule-5 eligible prospect, my interest in him is nil. The article points out several ways that payroll space could be freed up, but doesn't convince me that he's the guy to spend such savings on. As for the idea elsewhere in the thread that he was slotting in for us as a fifth starter when the trade occurred, my OCD kicks in and I reiterate a personal view that there is no such "role." Fifth starter is a very temporary spot on the roster, either for a youngster on his way up and about to take some other starter's job, a youngster who may not make the grade and will soon be back in St. Paul, a veteran trying to show he's still got it, or a veteran on his way to being DFAed and perhaps lost on waivers with no regrets. It would be a very solid pitching staff indeed to be able to carry a "pretty good" starter all season in a clear fifth-man role - rare to the point of not being worth discussing. He does have a track record as a successful starter "when healthy." But "fool me twice, shame on me." Go fool some bottom-feeder team this time, and maybe they get lucky with a shiny trinket to trade at the deadline.

Unless and until the rule book is changed to define it that way. You'd basically never notice the difference and the game would move along more smoothly.

Ditto for a St Paul game I was at last week. All but one went the challenger's way. Left to their own devices the schoolyard way, it seems like the players themselves might call a better game.

Oh yes, we should totally make up a symbol of our own. /s

Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch....

So did I. 😀

Ober's got 9 more starts maybe? Will he reach 20 wins?

Did you know that an anagram of the name Eduardo Beltre is "Eduardo Belter"? It really makes you think, doesn't it?

Tying the DH to the starting pitcher makes some conceptual sense, and is implemented through a minimum of word changes in the rules (unlike all those other proposals which have to watch out for loopholes). Aside from the straight disincentive to removing the starter until he's not effective or is gassed, the teams will feel pressure with their 26-man roster, probably being uncomfortable with only 13 bats on the roster, and a decision (rather than a rule) to go with a 12-man pitching staff has the reinforcing effect on lengthening starter innings. The extra-innings runner rule is IMO helpful here too, to reduce the number of boring marathon game where the pitcher would be batting a lot of times. I'm also in favor of deadening the baseball, turning a lot of would-be sluggers into Warning Track Power Kings who will need to shorten their strokes (and in the process reduce the strikeouts) or make way for someone who will. Pitchers in turn will be a little less incentivized to go max-effort on every pitch. In my more radical moments I would 1) invest billions to move outfield walls (and the stands behind them) back by 75 feet to make the game more athletic and entertaining, and 2) admit that Babe Ruth Was A Mistake and make every ball that goes out of the playing field a foul ball. Eh, I'll settle for the slightly deadened ball, if I can get that.

Bet the team trainer and rest of the medical staff didn't think of this neat trick! 😀

Margot's defensive skills seem to have eroded from his previously fine reputation, and his offense has been subpar. I suspect the Twins could have gotten similar offense from DaShawn Keirsey and better defense as a bonus, without consuming the precious payroll headroom that Margot cost. So no, he's not been worth it. The swap of infield prospects is a head-scratching add-on that we won't see play out for several more seasons, likely.

What in the world are you talking about? I was responding to a post about Dobnak. You quoted Dobnak's 7.2 innings. Someone else replied that that's a small sample size. Suddenly you are quoting Varland's minor league stats for some reason.

Was his name by any chance "Totals"? I saw him in the box score. He's been around a while now.

So are you actually disagreeing with anything I said? I carefully compared the teams in 1987 and except for Detroit and Toronto the Twins had an advantage on offense versus every other team when Gagne played. Thus he was underrated offensively because people fail to take into account that shortstops often get a pass on offense because the position is so important. OPS+ is useful to know but it has to be in the context of what other teams are putting up against you. The same number from your shortstop can become a liability if it's your left fielder or DH, every time you look at the lineup card your manager sends out there versus the other team's.

No one can claim him. The waivers are a formality. The player in this case has control over his own destiny. The league's rules cover this case - otherwise there could be subterfuge in getting around someone's NTC. He's released, and then he can choose the team he signs with. Or, just sit at home and count his cash that continues to come in. His choice.

I'll go you one better. Gagne was a lot more effective hitter than most folks give him credit for. Most games, he gave the Twins a competitive advantage at bat over whoever the opposing team was running out there - all except obvious exceptions of Detroit and Toronto in 1987 for instance. And his defense being top-notch made the advantage just that much sweeter.

Why are we talking about Varland?

He IS a bargain at $5M. No question. The fallacy is thinking that's a good thing. Contending teams don't build the free-agent portion of their roster $5M at a time, though. And the only reason analytics shows a high value like $18.5M is because teams have to outbid each other for average talent.

Not sure, but I assume you mean that as the compliment it would be if I had said it. 😀 Greg Gagne had a lot to do with that team jelling. And I'm not quite as high on Noah as that, but you never know.

I've definitely warmed up to Miranda's defense and currently feel a bit more comfortable in any given game when Jose is there. I've seen Jose make difficult plays there, and I've seen Royce make difficult plays there. Both have flubbed plays that on a different day they might have made. They're very different kinds of defenders but the net results have been similar. Neither of them is exactly an asset at third, quite yet. Royce is maybe considered to have the higher defensive upside there, but that's for the future. So I'd actually be okay with the combination you named. Or vice versa at 1B-3B if the team can unlock more out of Lewis than he's currently showed. Second base is another story, also with intriguing options. Infield is a team strength; I wish the outfield were coming together as nicely. The key is one of Miranda or Lewis stepping up just a bit and making 3B his own. The other's bat will play at 1B, probably, though Miranda's bat doesn't have quite the pedigree Lewis's does.

I don't know if I'd even go that far. There's probably an upper limit on how good a truly bad hitter not nicknamed Hurricane can be in 40 at bats. But I agree there is practically no lower limit to how bad a good hitter can be during that stretch.

I doubt you'd find anyone competent in a major league FO holding to such a mistaken view. What they might say is that where you stand on defense gives your team more (or less) flexibility in finding more base hits elsewhere on the diamond. The fallacy, if there is one, is spending $5M on a Carlos Santana and declaring him to be a bargain. I personally aim higher than his current .754 OPS, because you can find first basemen who hit far better than that. It's much less easy to find someone who plays SS as well as Carlos Correa does and who also hits like a first baseman is expected to. The jury's still out whether Royce Lewis can be that kind of player too, but if he is, he gives the Twins a chance to add a third masher "who hits like a first baseman," and then actually play him there. The tragedy is the players they've tried there (like Kirilloff) who haven't performed, and then settling for a $5m bargain. The hits count the same, but you can get more of them than they currently are.

Concur. Willi didn't just show up on planet Earth this year. He had over 500 plate appearances against lefties before this stretch of 38 PA, with an OPS above .700. The lefties across the majors since 2019 were mystified how to reduce this bum to tears, until they all had a meeting a couple of months ago and finally figured it out? If you look at just the one player, you may think you've discovered an insight. But if you slice and dice the stats for every player in the majors, you'll come across 38-PA oddities all over the place Lord knows I'm not a Manuel Margot woofer, but this business about his inability to get a base hit as a pinch hitter is a similar construct. Nothing else about his 2024 suggests a lack of clutch-y-ness - his OPS with bases empty is actually just slightly worse than his OPS with men on base, etc. Early in his career he was fine in a pinch-hitting role, so it's not plausible he's suffering from nerves now. He's just suffering from slice-and-dice-itis. I'm not saying slicing and dicing is bad. It can be how problems get identified. The charts in this article are interesting, but baseball is a cat-and-mouse game at all times, and this looks to me like something that will get corrected in the normal course of events anyway. I don't think Willi Castro is dumb.