Parker Hageman

If you log onto the World Wide Web and check out the 2024 Catcher Framing Leaderboard on Baseball Savant, you must scroll pretty far down to find Minnesota Twins catcher Ryan Jeffers. It's been a slow slide down that leaderboard since 2021, when he was near the top of the list, saving the team two runs in the process. But his downward trajectory isn't all his fault: the Twins have instructed catchers in the organization to sit middle-middle, presenting prominent targets. This somewhat counters the bottomfeeder ethos introduced by Tanner Swanson. The Twins catchers were encouraged to get under the ball and get it back toward the middle of the zone, thus blurring the edges of the strike zone for pitches at or near the bottom. Swanson moved on to the New York Yankees organization, and his successor, Tucker Frawley, leaned into the philosophy that catchers should set up middle-middle to present a clear target well within the borders of the strike zone for the pitcher. This method diverted from trying to nab pitches on the corners to some degree. Framing is still very much a practice the Twins emphasize in their receiving methods – catchers will still pull pitches toward the middle of the zone – but the newer practice centers on the idea that pitchers will miss less when aiming directly at the center of the zone. Research shows that even the most elite pitchers in the league do not have the precision we like to believe. Many readers will swear Greg Maddux had command so fine he could hit a penny off a hummingbird's back, but most pitchers regularly miss their intended targets by up to two baseballs’ diameters. If a catcher is set up on the edges of the zone, this could mean pitches wind up in non-competitive areas. The concepts of framing and targeting are intertwined. Both are mainly trying to increase the margins in favor of the defense, and to flip counts. By setting up middle-middle, the defensive side is hedging that they will be able to increase the number of favorable counts by having their pitchers throw more in-zone strikes – even if they miss their intended target. While a catcher might gain strikes by providing targets or setting up on the corners or bottom of the strike zone, pitchers may lose more strikes by egregiously missing their spot. No amount of showmanship behind the plate will win a strike that bounces on the way there.

As a young pitcher in the Padres organization, Chris Paddack knew he needed something that would move to his glove side--away from a right-handed batter, and in on a left-handed one. He had a fastball with ride and a changeup with fade. He did not have a pitch that moved away from righties, though. He eventually landed on a curveball, but even that offering broke more vertically than horizontally. It was also thrown at 78-80 miles per hour, leaving a big gap between its speed and that of his other two pitches. The main reason Paddack could not throw a slider effectively was that the way he naturally released the ball (having his hand and wrist twist to the left of the ball and imparting spin that moved toward righties, or pronation) prevented him from throwing a traditional slider--a pitch on which right-handed pitchers would have to get around the right side of the baseball with their fingers, or supinate. "I'm a pronator," Paddack said about how his hand twists upon release. This makes producing the spin that would help pitches move to the glove side challenging. Paddack has a much easier time creating arm-side movement, as seen in his two-plane fastball or his changeup that sinks and fades. One aspect of how he got the new slider to move in the direction he wanted stems from the grip to which the Twins staff introduced him. The Twins' pitching development staff is extremely adept at optimizing pitches. The tech guys, as Paddack refers to the people who interpret the data, helped figure out a way to get him to that movement. "We actually changed the grip late spring," he said. "[Now it's] more of a two-seam cutter." Paddack cited Matt Daniels as the coach who aided in the new grip. Daniels has become an increasingly vital and visible part of the team's instruction group recently. For most of the spring, Paddack would throw his slider with a typical grip along the horseshoe of a baseball and try to manipulate the ball by pulling down on the side. This resulted in inconsistent glove-side movement. The new grip would be similar to a two-seam fastball, but with a notable difference – he moved his thumb up the side of the ball.

On Saturday, as a solid volume of people were making their way to their assigned section at JetBlue Park in Ft. Myers, Edouard Julien dug into the batter’s box, destroying the painstaking work of turning the home plate area into a clean slate that six grounds crew members completed just 15 minutes earlier. Almost as soon as he entered the box, Julien was running out of it, having deposited Nick Pivetta’s first pitch of the game cleanly into right field for a base hit. In his next two at-bats, Julien followed the same script: He swung at a first-pitch curveball and then a first-pitch slider. The results were not the same as his opening at-bat: he fouled off the curveball and bounced the slider harmlessly to Enmanuel Valdez at second. Following the game, Rocco Baldelli was asked why the trend has gone away from the patient, count-working approach by leadoff hitters. “The pitching is so good,” he said. “If you get a really good pitch to hit on the first pitch of the bat, you better freaking swing at it, because you may get nothing like that again the rest of the bat.” But Julien doesn’t just "freaking swing at it;" he impacts it. He’s becoming an ambush artist: a patient but lethal assailant. From a fundamental standpoint, Julien’s swing is somewhat atypical for a left-handed hitter. A high percentage of lefties have shown the tendency to drive fastballs in the lower third for power. Think of Ken Griffey Jr’s swing. Overall, lefties slugged .455 on fastballs in the lower third. Julien, meanwhile, posted a .108 slugging percentage on those same pitches. On the plus side, while the rest of his lefty-swinging brethren slugged .387 against fastballs up in the zone, he drives those pitches better than average (.468). Of course, like most hitters, Julien also makes meals out of being thrown pitches in the middle third (.345/.389/.642) and it’s where he produces the most hard contact (50% of contact is 95+ MPH). So it probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that, when Julien enters the batter’s box, this is almost exclusively his first-pitch swing location.

Brooks Lee, Twins Daily’s second-ranked prospect, left Thursday’s game against the Nationals with back spasms. He will be looked at by the Twins’ training staff to determine the next course of action. His reassignment is unrelated to the injury, but he is unlikely to play in any games between now and the start of the regular season. It's not ideal to have this expected demotion happen in the shadow of a potentially nagging injury, but Lee acquitted himself gorgeously in his time with the big-leaguers. He's not on the 40-man roster and wasn't a serious candidate for the Opening Day roster, but assuming he gets healthy at back in action soon for St. Paul, he could still factor into the team's plans during the first half of the season. “I think he had a better than a good camp,” Rocco Baldelli said of Lee’s spring performance. “I think he had a great camp. He showed us that he can go out there and play shortstop. He left everyone with an excellent feeling with his time here.” It's interesting to hear the skipper call out the work Lee put in at shortstop, specifically. Because of Carlos Correa's long-term contract, many have glossed over any possibility that Lee will stick at the six as he matriculates to the majors. It's still likely that he plays mostly at another position, but impressing Baldelli and the coaches with his defensive work on the left side ensures that Lee will be in position to be called up and installed, should Correa battle injuries again and a need arise at short. We've been assuming Kyle Farmer would be the de facto starter in such a situation, and that could still be true, but Lee showing out has increased his chances of being the one to whom the team turns in case of a need that stretches beyond a day or two, toward a month or two. In combination with the glove, he also proved he can hit big-league pitching in competitive settings--and perhaps that he can bring a different dynamic to the homers-and-strikeouts mad Twins lineup. The switch-hitting infielder hit .333/.351/.611 with seven extra-base hits in 13 Grapefruit League games. He made some modifications to his swing that have produced favorable results. The Twins’ roster is now down to 40 players in camp. Were you holding out hope for Lee to make the Opening Day roster? What do you want to see from him early on in Triple A? Join the discussion below, as the season draws into sight on the horizon.

As spring training season kicks into gear, the Minnesota Twins' pitchers are honing their craft with a meticulously planned routine to optimize performance for the upcoming season. While the casual observer might only catch glimpses of players on the field during games, the behind-the-scenes regimen is organized to ensure peak physical condition and mental acuity. Let's delve into what, precisely, the pitchers' spring training schedule entails and the objectives they aim to accomplish. At the core of the Twins pitchers' spring training routine is a structured three-day throwing cycle. The cycle consists of one side day (a bullpen with just a catcher or a live session with a hitter in the box) and two non-side days. This cycle is a common practice to ensure pitchers can maintain their skills. "This is what spring training is for. It's just kind of getting us broken in," said incoming reliever Josh Staumont. Staumont, who spent his career in the Royals organization, said this program is nothing new. "A three-day kind of thing that's just the standard practice field." Staumont added that pitchers might work toward a four-day cycle later in camp, including back-to-back live side days to replicate getting called to pitch in consecutive games. However, the three-day schedule is king as arms are ramping at the beginning of spring. During "side" days, not in-game action, pitchers focus primarily on bullpen sessions or live batting practice (BP). Side days are the time for pitchers to fine-tune their mechanics, work on specific pitches, and simulate game-like scenarios under the guidance of pitching coaches. The bullpen sessions allow pitchers to concentrate on their individual needs, whether that be refining their fastball command, perfecting the break on their curveball, or experimenting with new pitch grips. These bullpen sessions also have a Fogo De Chao amount of technology involved. There are cameras, Trackman units, and biomechanical tools. Everything (seen and unseen) is measured. Collecting data is essential for pitchers working on a new pitch, or refining an existing one. When the Twins asked Pablo López to add a sweeper to his arsenal, they were looking for a precise amount of break, spin direction, and velocity. It was in spring training sides that he honed those. This process is vital in a strong pipeline of developing pitchers. "You see some of these young pitchers who have interesting pitches, interesting skills or traits, maybe velo, maybe something with the two-seamer, something with the slider. But the difference between a successful major-league pitcher with that talent and a guy who's right on the edge of that is so, so thin," Derek Falvey told reporters early in camp. "We've found that if you can find a way to get a little more consistency out of the strike-throwing or a little more consistency out of the slider, whatever you've got that separates you, all of a sudden it turns into something."