Sssuperdave

I love 538 but they've had a lot of click-bait headlines lately. It's kind of ironic because I think the article is actually a lot more interesting than the headline implies. It's not a thought experiment regarding getting rid of the minors. Rather, it's a very interesting wholesale look at how player development works and could work. On a different note, I'd love it if there were fewer affiliated minor leagues/teams and more independent minor leagues. Affiliated minor leagues are 99.9% about potential, not necessarily pure merit. There are tons of players in their upper 20s and early 30s, or even older, that could dominate AA competition, but there is no room for them in organized ball because that is their ceiling. I'd love it if there was more of a market where those sorts of players could make a living playing ball. Independent ball is actually a bit more of a straight-up meritocracy, other than the gimmicky player here and there.

As usual, another spot on hilarious piece from randballs stu. I think I agree with Mr. Hanson that Berrios throwing meat is a 911 worthy emergency!

I'm hoping for three innings of Dobnak... let everyone else have another day off!

Right now the Twins have 5 pitchers on pace to throw enough innings to qualify for the ERA title. That last happened in 1963... Jim Perry, Dick Stigman, Lee Stange, Camilo Pascual, and Jim Kaat. And the worst ERA of that bunch was Jim Kaat!

Amazing the difference a 3 game win streak can make. The Twins pulled out a winning month of July at 13-11. Their record has been above .500 every month in 2019.The Twins are now 2 games behind the Astros and Yankees for top record in the AL, and Cleveland is 3 games behind the Twins. So, they are closer to having the best record in the AL than they are to 2nd place in their division.The Twins are now 25 games above .500, which is their high water mark.

Where are you getting these stats? According to baseball reference he had a 1.54 ERA in the DOSL as a 17 year old, and his age 22 season is this year, with a 4.99 ERA in AA. He hasn't been in rookie ball since he was 18. I'm seeing a 3.87 career minor league ERA.

For hitters Polanco is a pretty easy choice, but I can do some mental gymnastics to choose Berrios as the team MVP. Polanco has 4.0 bWAR and Berrios is at only 2.0, so this is a stretch, but here goes... One way of thinking about MVP could be to ask "whose injury would have hurt the team the most?" If I imagine a world where Berrios was injured for the entire first half, it changes things dramatically. He has pitched 112 innings (13 more than any other pitcher) with a 2.89 ERA, so that is 112 innings that would have been picked up by guys like Stewart, Smeltzer, Littell, Thorpe, and Poppen. In WAR terms, Berrios would not have actually been replaced by a "replacement-level" player. That 112 innings pitched by others would probably have been negative WAR. Regarding Polanco, the Twins had enough depth, at least until the most recent string of injuries, that they might have been better able to weather a Polanco injury. Polanco's 370 plate appearances would have been picked up by guys like Gonzalez, Adrianza, Astudillo, Arraez, and Cave, and his innings in the field would have been picked up by Gonzalez, Adrianza, and Arraez. I think that group would have produced a positive WAR. I don't know if the difference in quality of replacements is enough to make up the 2.0 WAR gap between Polanco and Berrios, but it's at least an interesting way to think about it.

2 things... 1. I see Astudillo in the starting lineup tonight, so the article originally referenced was obviously old. 2. What a weird turn this thread took regarding sample size and quoting statistics. I think it's pretty obvious what happened with Astudillo... he started really hot, cooled off big time, was sent down to AAA, hit the lights out in AAA, and has been doing pretty well in the four games since being recalled. There were some stats quoted in this thread that weren't really given the proper context.

I wasn't listening to that, but I wonder if it was more of a throw away line than a statement that Cleveland is the "team to beat" or "in the driver's seat" or anything like that. I mean, the Twins are clear favorites to win the division at that this point. Fivethirtyeight has them at 89% likelihood to win the division, and I'm pretty sure other sites that forecast are similar. I think it's kind of a principle... Cleveland will be the defending AL Central Champs until the day another team clinches the Central. Maybe "the road still goes through Cleveland" is another way of saying that, and would be said even if they were in last place and 20 games behind. I think it's pretty silly though.

From 2000 - 2014 there were 242 pitchers drafted in the 2nd round. 116 of them made the majors so far (48%), and 28 of them have BWAR > 5 (23%). Over the same time period there were 237 pitchers drafted in the 7th round. 58 made the majors so far (24%) and 8 have BWAR >5 (3%). So, I'd say you've get better odds in the 2nd round than the 7th.

I see two questions being asked: 1. How do they even fill out their minor league rosters if they don't draft pitchers? My answer: There are 40 rounds to the draft. I would bet some good money that once all 40 rounds are complete they will have drafted at least 15 pitchers. Even if the draft fewer than that there are tons of other ways to get pitchers including undrafted free agents, players waived by other teams, independent minor leaguers, international free agents, etc. There are literally thousands of pitchers out there that could be signed. Of course, this is a bit of a silly question... which brings us to #2: 2. How do they expect to develop good pitching if they don't draft pitchers in the first 5-10 rounds? My answer: This I think is a valid concern and can be seen throughout the twins system. Most of best offensive players are players the Twins drafted and developed (or signed internationally and developed) - Buxton, Sano, Kepler, Polaco, Rosario, and Garver off the top of my head. Pitching on the other hand... Berrios, Gibson, Rogers, and that's pretty much it. Odorizzi, Pineda, Perez, Parker and Harper were all mostly developed by other organizations. This goes throughout the farm system too... most of the top prospects are position players... Kiriloff, Gordon, Lewis, Larnach, Rooker, Javier. The only top pitching prospect is Graterol and maybe Duran or Gonsalves or Romero if you still call them prospects. All that said, you can still get MLB pitching through trades or free agency. Odorizzi, Perez and Parker are great examples. Perhaps the Twins are simply better at developing position players, in which case it makes sense to do what you are good at and then trade for or sign pitchers after they've been developed by other teams. The main problem I see with this as it regards the Twins is that they haven't shown a lot of willingness to part with top position prospects for pitching or sign big name free agents. If they want an Ace to pair with Berrios at some point they'll either need to part with a guys like Royce Lewis & Alex Kirilloff and/or be willing to pay a pitcher $20+M/year.

Fun fact... prior to 1999, when Office Space was made, Swingline did not make a red stapler. The stapler in the movie was custom painted, and years later Swingline started actually producing red staplers in response to increased demand for them.

Wow, that gif of Berrios' curveball is awesome, especially at full speed. I don't know if I've ever seen a ball break that much. Seriously looked like it was going to hit the batter and then curves right over the plate.

I think it will be Adrianza or maybe Cave. With Sano back Gonzales will be free to play other positions, and both Garver and Astudillo have some positional flexibility, so this teams 3 catchers is not what you normally think of with 3 catchers.

Fivethirtyeight (one of my favorite websites) just posted a great article about Willians: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/willians-astudillo-is-a-baseball-enigma/

I guarantee you Mauer can squat way more than 55 pounds. I squat over 200 but start every workout with a warmup, and that warmup starts with 2 sets with nothing but the bar. Anyone could snap a picture of me doing those warmup sets, post it to facebook, and everyone could laugh at me for being a wimp. He was either warming up, rehabbing an injury, doing a deload, doing drop sets, or any of another half dozen+ explanations.

2 things: 1. I vividly remember reading an article in the strib several years ago that discussed Mauer's offseason home, and the fact that it included his own personal gym with weight training equipment that hadsome sort of USB port or something like that where he would plug a device in the to machine, do his sets & reps, and data on those sets & reps would be uploaded to a location where Twins trainers could see it. 2. On whether or not Sano is "overweight", I think a problem is that the term "overweight" brings all kind of baggage about fat vs muscle. It's possible for one's weight to be all muscle but for that to still not be ideal for certain athletic activities. On the most extreme end, you never see elite marathoners with huge amounts of muscle (or fat). I think there is universal agreement that Sano would be a better fielder, faster runner, etc. at a lower weight than he has played at so far no matter what his body composition is.

I hope I'm not derailing the conversation too much, but I'd like to share some random thoughts on some of the sabermetrics. I love Sabermetrics, but I've got one problem with the varying WAR stats, specifically the differences between bWAR, fWAR, and WARP. It doesn't bother me that the numbers themselves are different between the three, but when I look at the calculations it bothers me that the three seem to take very different fundamental approaches to the concept of Wins Above Replacement. When I think of WAR, I typically think of it as a "what actually happened" stat, as opposed to a stat that's intended to be predictive of future success. Take ERA vs FIP and xFIP. ERA is what actually happened, where FIP and especially xFIP are typically more predictive than ERA. I always think of WAR as more like ERA than xFIP. However, the three WARs all approach this differently. To me they seem to be on a progession from bWAR to fWAR to WARP going from most "what actually happened" to most predictive. A stat like DRC+ sounds really cool and really predictive, but I don't feel like it should be included in a WAR calculation. I guess what I'd really like is two stats: WAR and XWAR, where WAR would use more "what actually happened" stats, and XWAR would use more predictive stats. Kepler having WARP of 3.6, and being only 0.2 behind Rosario is preposterous if WARP is supposed to be a representation of what actually happened, but if it's meant to a predictive or expected measure, then it makes a lot more sense, and it's incumbent on the talent evaluators to decide whether there is something about Kepler that makes him consistently underperform expected stats. Take Ricky Nolasco - if I recall correctly he very consistently underperforms his xFIP. Kepler seems to have really low BABIPs despite his LD%'s. Is there something about him that keeps his BABIP in the toilet, or is he going to break out?

Saves with a 3 run lead is one of the most ridiculous statistical quirks in baseball. I would classify 3, 4, and 5 run leads with one inning left as mop-up work. You should be confident handing any pitcher on your staff the ball in those situations. If a pitcher can't consistently hold a 3 run lead for one inning they shouldn't be in the majors.

What’s the forecast in KC? Are they likely to play?

Yes, and they will also need 2 spots on the 40 man in the somewhat near future for each of May and Santana. If you put someone else on the 40 like Enns you might need to turn around and waive them to get May or Santana on the roster.

The comparison is about a lot more than size - it is about their profile as hitters. They are both extreme three-true-outcome players. For his Career, Carter has homered, walked, or struck out in 50.3% of his plate appearances. Sano has done so in 53.6%. They have almost identical Home Run %'s (5.5% for Carter and 5.4% for Sano), and Sano walks and strikes out a little more. The point is that if Sano continues with his current approach, several years from now he'll look back and will have had the same results as Chris Carter - made $2M-$3M per year for a few years and then struggling to stay relevant. An extreme alternative to that future is Giancarlo Stanton, another three-true-outcome player at 45.9%. The difference is that Stanton's Home Run% is higher than Sano's (6.4% vs 5.5%) and his K rate is lower (27.8% vs 36.1%). I don't expect Sano to ever have output like Stanton's, but if he can get his K% down to 30% or so and up his HR% just a little bit, he's staring at a $100M+ payday.

I agree with most of this but land just on the other side of the in/out line. One thing I totally agree with is that Mauer's HoF case is fringey, as evidenced by the huge amount of debate it generates. Miguel Cabrera for example doesn't generate debate like this because his case is rock solid. That said, even without using advanced analytics I think Joe has a pretty good case. One point you clearly made is that Joe was/is not really a catcher as most of his games will not be at the catching position. I agree with you overall, but he definitely was primarily a catcher from 2004 through 2013. It is fair to compare his 2004-2013 stats as a catcher to other catchers, and I think the BBWAA voters are savvy enough to do that. Here are some things he did as a catcher (i.e. through 2013), not including any advanced stats: 3 batting titles6 All-Star appearances3 Gold Gloves5 Silver Sluggers1 MVP.323 batting average, 10 HR and 63 RBI per season (I know, the HR and RBI total aren't that impressive)That's a pretty impressive resume. Not a slam dunk, but good enough to nudge him over the threshold in my opinion, especially if you let the advanced analytics in just a little and look at his OBP, OPS, and WAR over that period. Now, of course 2014 and forward hurts his resume. And, of course the next few years will really determine a lot. If he can have another 3-4 years like 2017 then he'll be up over 2500 hits (and maybe another gold glove?) making him pretty much a shoo-in. If he retires after this year then it would be totally reasonable for him to not make it. I would put him in but I won't think it's crazy if he doesn't make it.

Here's a really interesting sbnation article comparing a game from 1984 with a game from 2014 with an almost identical number of pitches, base runners, and plate appearances, but where the 2014 game took 35 minutes longer: https://www.sbnation.com/a/mlb-2017-season-preview/game-length The main conclusion is that time between pitches is the #1 driver of the increase in length: "inaction" pitches in the above quote are pitches where the catcher catches the ball and throws it back to the pitcher, so things other than hits, fouls, etc. A pitch clock is sounding better and better.

Oh, I certainly could be convinced that there were reasons beyond the lack of fans that caused the game to be short, but that was the shortest game the Orioles played all year, and the next 4 slowest games were all low scoring. There is an 8-3 game on August 24th that was 2 hours 18 minutes that could be a counterexample, but if feels like cherry-picking to me. The strike zone comment might be more on target - total # of pitches on the 2 hour 3 minute game was 227, which is quite low. It would be interesting to see a study correlating # of pitches with length of game. Are longer games driven more by # of pitches or length between pitches? While I don't have the data at my fingertips to answer this, I would think MLB would.