jay

I realize I'm nitpicking back, but it made me check again. I come up with 28617 1/3 IP for the SPs and 13335 ER in 2012 for an ERA of 4.19. Where's the 4.40 figure coming from? Major League Team Stats » 2012 » Starters » Standard Statistics | FanGraphs Baseball

Thanks, Nick. I prefer my offseason filled with visions of fresh beginnings and a dose grandeur. If I go through these realistically, I'd probably project this current squad to put up 715 and give up 770. A little closer to competitive, but more like 76-86. I do think 3, 4, 5, and 7 are very do-able. 1, 2, and 6 are stretches of varying levels from a toe-touch to Stohs dropping into the splits.

Can't disagree here. It's a hopeful wish, not so much a projection of reality. You never know though... someone could surprise... Gibson, Harden, Pelfrey, even Worley. Given how wretched production was at the bottom of the lengthy list of starters as someone else pointed out, it's not hard to see a significant improvement compared to last year, even if it's not all the way to average.

Great question. It wasn't a 'by the pitcher' breakdown that I used, but rather a look at the whole group. Here's the math I used to arrive at 100 runs for the rotation: The 2012 starters allowed 528 ER in 880 IP. (Minnesota Twins Team Stats » 2012 » Starters » Standard Statistics | FanGraphs Baseball) If we think they can be league-average in 2013, the ERA for the group will be around 4.10. I assumed the improved performance would lead to longer starts, for 940 IP. The 4.10 ERA at that many IP is 428 runs. So, 528-428... 100 fewer runs allowed.

Probably unlikely it all goes exactly right, but certainly not impossible. Hopefully it at least gives a little hope to the other side of all the doom and gloom projections.

A post in another thread (thanks, beckmt) got me thinking about this real hard... if by chance things do "go right" for the Twins next year, where could we expect them to end up? We can have a little fun with the Pythagorean Theorum to get a back-of-the-napkin idea. This formula factors runs scored and allowed to come up with the number of wins a team could expect on average. Last year, the Twins scored 701 runs and gave up 832 for a pythag-projection of 68 wins (compared to our actual 66 wins). So, if we run through a series of potential and desireable fates, we can take a stab at adjusting the number of runs scored (or allowed) from last year and see where we stand. 1. CF production is adequately replaced by a young player (or retread, for that matter) and matches Span's production. Net 0 runs. 2. Plouffe turns into an above average three-bagger with a .270 avg and 25+ HRs. This would put his offensive production in the Ryan Zimmerman range and move his projected RC (runs created) from mid-50s to 95ish. +40 runs scored. 3. Parmelee sticks and does well enough to post .280 / 30 2Bs / 15 HRs. This puts C-Parm around 90 runs created. The Twins generated 80 offensive runs from RF in 2012. Parmelee's defense compared to Revere will cancel out that gain. +10 runs scored, +10 runs allowed. 4. Mauer and Morneau have good years and stay healthy. Mauer did just that last year, so no change there. Morneau could top his second half numbers and end up with an OPS around .825 for +20 runs scored. 5. Dozier, Carroll, and Florimon hold down the MI and hit .260+. The defense improves some and a marginal increase in BA provides +10 runs scored and -5 runs allowed . 6. Fresh blood in the rotation allows starting pitching to improve dramatically with a group ERA a little above 4. This would get the rotation back to about MLB-average and, despite an increase in IP, result in -100 runs allowed. 7. Bullpen remains solid. The Twins were MLB-average here last year despite marginal performances by some contributors. The improved rotation results help the pen stay rested and pitch fewer innings (558 down to 500) resulting in -25 runs allowed. Now, this all assumes the team stays healthy and we don't see regression from any of the folks not named here (looking at you, Josh Willingham). These rosy scenarios would put the Twins runs scored at 781 and runs allowed at 712 for a pythagorean projected record of 88-74. So, what do you say? Could everything go right for the Twins in 2013 and reverse the dreaded start of our downfall in 2011 when everything went wrong? What else could go right and push these numbers higher?

We certainly haven't upgraded the offense or bullpen with acquisitions. I'm not so sure I think Harden, Pelfrey, and Correia will net the Twins 14 wins even if the wheels 'stay on'.

TR: Do you know if the hotel is beeper friendly? [What do you mean?] I'm not getting a sig' on my beeper. Later, TR: You probably get this a lot. This isn't the real Caesar's Palace, is it? [What do you mean?] Did, ummm... Caesar live here? [No.] I didn't think so.

If they wanted to spend that money on the pen, they could have gotten an elite reliever with a solid track record of consistency for that money. For some reason, I don't picture Correia fulfilling that if he ends up in the pen. Myers has at least shown he can be an above-average reliever if starting doesn't work out. I'm willing to give Correia a chance, but you're painting it a bit rosy here.

Brock, the scroll bar at the top of the MLB section isn't working.

Pretty disappointing that Torii would put this out publicly. It's one thing to have a viewpoint on something that isn't PC, but it's another thing to speak it out loud as a highly visible MLB player. For someone who champions black issues, it's a little surprising he's not very tolerant of others.

I'm not sure if you're saying the Twins should be trading for younger bats or just floating a warning. Hultzen would be quite the get, but Span brought back a top 50 prospect (by most rankings) in a deal some analysts thought we got short-changed. Then, Revere fetched a bunch. It doesn't seem outwardly crazy to think Hammer could bring back a top 50 prospect, especially as the market for power continues to develop.

I think that's a pretty fair way to look at it. I think the TD folks would be hoping (with no way to ever verify) that TR has at least floated the idea out there instead of sitting back and waiting for a team like the Mariners to put something on the table. The unknown amount of communication that actually takes place is what I think leaves folks frustrated.

Which is exactly why the Twins should still consider moving him this offseason, as hard as it might be to justify trading away a third starting OF.

I thought those comments were related to getting back a current MLB middle of the rotation pitcher as opposed to a prospect (who obviously isn't a proven commodity). If Nick Swisher gets > 4/50 as rumored, I would tend to think Hultzen is pretty reasonable to ask for when you look at Hammer's remaining 2/14.

ESPN's Jim Bowden names some top prospects that could be dealt in the near future to fill holes at the MLB level. He specifically names SPs Danny Hultzen from the Mariners, Julio Teheran from the Braves, Jameson Taillon from the Pirates, and Zach Lee from the Dodgers. About Hultzen, "Hultzen has middle-of-the-rotation stuff with his changeup being his best secondary pitch and his command and control the difference-maker. Hultzen should be enough to garner a 20-home run, 80 RBI-type bat in return." The next top prospects to be traded - The GM's Office by Jim Bowden Blog - ESPN (Insider required) I think we could certainly match up with Mariners and Braves. Would Willingham be enough to get Hultzen or Teheran? Any chance the Twins would trade a third OF this offseason?

A free agent deal should be based off 'expected WAR' going forward. So, of course you'll see TONS of variation based on what different teams expect a player to do going forward. You also see other factors affect how much a team is willing to pay for a free agent or give up in a trade (see: Blue Jays, Toronto and Dickey, R.A.)... which makes sense since going from 86 wins to 90 wins is incredibly more valuable than something like 66 to 70. You literally can't come up with a perfectly correlated pattern since there literally isn't one. WAR (and FG dollars) at least provides a baseline designed to equally measure all players as best possible. I agree with you that velocity, movement, and control would be great things to further assess a pitcher, but the point is you haven't named a stat that exists today that can be used as a better alternative to WAR.

I agree 100% on waiting to bring either of them up until after the projected Super 2 date. However, if the Twins don't bring anyone in, my worry would be about what the Twins would be left with if someone got dinged up or injured. I wouldn't mind seeing them try to grab either an old vet like someone mentioned or try to grab a 4th OF off waivers just before or during ST (a la Mastroianni). I don't see what it would hurt.

If it's a free agent deal you're looking to assess, I would in fact say WAR can be used as one measurement through something like FG's dollar values. It's a more accurate assessment of what the player/pitcher contributed on his own. The WAR that a team expects a player to generate should definitely correlate pretty well to what they'd be willing to pay. There is no perfect predictor or magic 8 ball anywhere in this world and WAR doesn't claim to be either. However, it's a better predictor of a player's future performance than things like wins, RBIs, etc. I still haven't seen you cite a real measurement that exists as a better way to measure a player's value or contributions.

You're absolutely right that an individual team should value players slightly differently based on their park and other factor they know (ie strong infield defense), but that's not what WAR tries to do. WAR intentionally removes those factors to provide an unbiased and equally comparable measure of a player's contributions. If you're faulting WAR for not providing 30 different valuations or being able to see inside a GM's head, then you win on that point. You're also right that certain things probably can't be quantified, but I'm not sure how you'd ever prove (let alone measure) an individual player's perception of his defense. We can come up with impossibilities all day long. Regardless, I still haven't seen you provide something that provides a better measure of a player's (or team's) performance.

If you understood correlation ratios, you would know that mid .8 is an exceptionally strong correlation. It measures what it is supposed to measure and then there is a certain amount of variation (about .15 in this case) caused by other factors. If you have a better stat that can project a team's record, I'd be happy to hear about it. I don't see how you can continue to say something is worthless and inaccurate when you don't have anything better. I fundamentally disagree with you and I have no idea why you'd want to assess a pitcher's performance (the question in this post) based on his teammates. If David Price takes the mound with Little Leaguers behind him, he has no control over that but his standard stats would be far, far worse... and you certainly can't tell me that means he's a worse pitcher. Many of the advanced stats intend to remove those such things (defense, park factors, league, etc) so that you're comparing pitchers on a even apple to apple level.

oldnurse is completely wrong. FG's dollar amount uses the assumption that each win above replacement level is worth a certain dollar value (about $4.5M, I believe) on the free agent market and multiplies the player's WAR by that value. For example, Josh Willingham's 3.9 WAR from 2012 would be "worth" $17.6M. You have to be careful to use any one year to project a contract value, as it can't account for other factors like regression, injury risk, etc (ie - Willingham had a great year, but he wouldn't get $17M/year on the FA market as most people think he'll regress at least some). One could theoretically track the free agent deals that a front office signs and compare it back to the FG dollar value to get a rough idea if the contract provided surplus value or not.

There are so many incorrect statements in this it's hard to know where to start. You seem to be so very intent on bashing WAR as worthless, when it is largely a very good tool. Those who preach it as the end-all-be-all are equally incorrect, but continuing to cherry pick outliers to make examples is never a valid way to prove or disprove anything. Wins are widely regarded as an extremely poor stat to measure a pitcher's skill. A "win" for a pitcher includes many things he has no control over -- ie offensive runs scored, the defense behind him, the bullpen that follows, etc -- which WAR intentionally removes to reach a more accurate measure of the pitcher's actual skill by looking at factors a pitcher can control or heavily effect. So, you're correct that WAR commonly won't equal a pitcher's wins, but it will without question provide a better measure of a pitcher's performance than "wins" -- the original question of the post. We've already reviewed WAR's accuracy over a whole season to a team's actual record (a very strong .83-.89) with you. For the record, replacement level among the different WAR methods equates to between 43 and 52 wins on a full season... not your cited .500 record. It might help to understand how a stat works before you continually spout how ineffective it is.

This is on point. I think we need to watch LaRoche also. We should be hoping those two sign huge contracts to make our guys seem more like bargains. Once those two sign, we could see demand for both Willingham and Morneau pick up steam. The Mariners, Rangers, Orioles, Red Sox, Braves (still) or even Nats (again) could be some potential spots. Personally, I'd be okay with moving Willingham (peak value), but I think we'd be better off keeping Morneau until the trade deadline.