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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    Sure, of course. Projections can't and shouldn't predict performances like that. It's not what they do. But they can suggest a performance lean that isn't readily apparent, and that information can have some value. Keep in mind, the context of this discussion is a poster claiming that "no reasonable projection would expect a contribution from his bat" in regards to Wade. When in fact it seems that every public projection system seems to give that outcome a reasonable shot (above comparable prospects). This wasn't a generic debate questioning the validity of all projections, this was a specific claim invoking projections (incorrectly, it appears). I am sure the claim will shift now to an irrefutable appeal to authority argument, that the Twins know best in this specific case...
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    Here are some 2018 Twins projections from Steamer: https://www.fangraphs.com/projections.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&type=steamer&team=8&lg=all&players=0 It doesn't include guys with zero MLB time, so you have to click through their individual pages to see them. https://www.fangraphs.com/projections.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&type=steamer&team=8&lg=all&players=0 Jake Cave is at 78-80 wRC+, Gordon at 68-70, Rooker at 71-78, Wiel at 68, etc. Anything stand out as out of line?
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    Another way to look at it: if Wade had a high ISO to go along with the rest of his performance, he would be a top 100 prospect for sure, maybe even upper half. I don't think that should be the threshold required for promotion.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't get that impression. It's not like they regularly project rookies to be stars. There is certainly a bit more volatility with rookie projections, sure. A lot of that is probably guys like Kinley who are terrible in a small sample and don't have the opportunity to normalize those numbers to merely bad.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    You keep repeating this as if Wade is a banjo hitter like Granite. He's not. No matter how much importance you want to assign to ~1.5 extra total bases per month in their AA seasons, Wade's profile is much closer to Grossman's minor league profile (in fact possibly better if you consider his dramatically lower K rate to go along with his similar ISO and BB rate). Wade probably won't be a star or reach his AA 135 wRC+ in MLB, but the ZiPS/Steamer projections for Wade seem entirely reasonable right now (89-97). No guarantee he would do it, of course, but it could be fairly valuable to the Twins to find out, at least with a promotion to AAA (seriously, what do we see in Jake Cave if he can't crack this roster right now?). Grossman/LaMarre does not appear to be viable, considering offense plus defense plus roster concerns (they both have to be each other's exclusive substitute right now), and I suspect this isn't the last time we're going to need a replacement for Buxton.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    Well, if you want to express it as 22 doubles to 30, you also have to subtract 8 singles. Net +4 doubles, or less than 1 per month. 91 PAs? Aren't you usually reminding folks about sample size? Why wouldn't you be using his stats from last season, where he had roughly double that rate of XBH? Does the most recent 91 PA trump that somehow? What would you have predicted for Grossman when he moved up to AAA and posted an .083 ISO, in the PCL with a league ISO of .144? Then came to MLB that same season and posted a .101 ISO? Nobody made Grossman improve upon his roughly league average ISO in AA before they would advance him. I'm not guaranteeing that Wade would succeed, but when he has to be added to the 40-man this year anyway, and you are stuck starting either Grossman or LaMarre in your outfield every single day right now, would it hurt that much find out? What is the point of having Jake Cave on the roster with options instead if he's not even going to play the outfield over Grossman or LaMarre? At least move Wade up to AAA so you are better prepared for the next time an outfielder gets hurt.
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    Projections are based on component comps. It's not a fixed adjustment applied to every player. Heck, Grossman's rookie performance is probably a part of Wade's projection (as would be the success/failure of players similar to Grossman and Wade). With your comparison, you're ignoring league factors. Grossman and Wade are very similar by the criteria you specify. Here are the relative stats for their AA debut seasons: Grossman: 22.5 years old ISO +.012 compared to his leagues BB% +5.6% compared to his leagues Wade 23.3 years old ISO -.006 compared to his league BB% +5.5% compared his league Park factors could add another layer, but I'm not seeing any meaningful difference here. That ISO difference is, what, 8 total bases over a full season? More stats to consider: Grossman's K rate at AA was virtually the same as his league average, while Wade's was 7.8% lower than his league average last year (and even better this year).
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    Steamer doesn't project playing time / counting stats for him. You can still look at the rate stats of the projection, it comes to a 97 wRC+. You can also click the "Projections" link just above the stat table which will toggle the preseason projections. Steamer is basically the same, and ZiPS was at 89 wRC+ (and included some counting stats for illustration). https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=sa856280&position=OF
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    Not to mention his own chant! Maybe they promoted him to be a calming influence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kK5AohCMX0U
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't think that's necessarily a "power pen" in the context of 2018. That bullpen K/9 rate is only 14th in MLB this year, and it's artificially inflated by the number of hits we've allowed. Our bullpen K% is only 22nd in MLB.
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    I think it's pretty close to unthinkable to expect a similar impact from ANY pitcher. Especially one like Romero making his MLB debut after only 4 good but not dominant games at AAA. (Keep in mind, Liriano had 14 incredible starts at AAA in 2005, plus a 6 game September callup to MLB to get his feet wet, plus his early season bullpen work in 2006.)
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    I was talking about absolute reliever usage relative to league, rather than our team's relative reliever vs starter inning distribution.
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    I'm not sure why you'd say that. At the same age as Wade is now, Grossman already had almost 300 PA in MLB with a 95 OPS+, and would go on to log another 400 more at 91 OPS+ before his next birthday. That's pretty close to the 101 OPS+ that Grossman put up last year (and that Fangraphs is projecting for the rest of his 2018 season). Why is it unreasonable to think Wade could be in the same range at the same age? Wade has had a better wRC+ than Grossman at every level of the minors so far, and Wade has also struck out notably less than Grossman in the minors too, which makes his performance less dependent on BABIP. Grossman was a high school draftee, but that advantage was mostly neutralized when he had to repeat A-ball for a full season. At the time of their AA debuts, Grossman and Wade were less than a year apart in age. Wade will require a 40-man roster spot this upcoming offseason too, so it's not like we'd be rushing him from that perspective either. I guess calling him up before August makes it more likely that he could use an option this year, but even worst-case scenario, he wouldn't run out of options until his age 27 season, a year later than Grossman did (Grossman burned his first option at age 23).
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    1. Twins relievers have the 8th fewest innings pitched in MLB so far this season. Mostly a function of having the fewest games played, but even on a per-game basis, we are within 1 out of MLB average relief innings per game (MLB average is 3.2 IP, Twins at 4 IP). I'd guess we've used more total relievers than average too, so the workload has been spread out a bit. Here are the IP ranks of individual Twins relievers: 14. Pressly 37. Reed 92. Hildenberger 156. Rogers 185. Duke 204. Rodney 240. Duffey 248. Moya 265. Busenitz 275. Kinley 282. Magill 2. Grossman started 75% of the time for the Twins in 2016 in 2017. He has only started 56% of the games in 2018 so far. I don't think over-exposure is the cause of his 2018 struggles. Adrianza has indeed started more in 2018, but he's only 2 starts ahead of his 2017 rate so far. LaMarre has only started 6 games all year. It's not like previous Twins teams haven't seen marginal guys get similar playing time (don't forget, the 2017 team had Danny Santana to open the season, later had mediocre performances from rookies Garver and Granite, and even had Adrianza start 9 games in the outfield). 3. Castro and Morrison are definitely under-performing, but Dozier and Rosario are within 10% of their career OPS+ figures. On the pitching side, Lynn and Rogers are really the only regulars who are under-performing expectations.
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    Yeah, that is a weird one. Wade had a 135 wRC+ at AA last year -- and they're making him repeat the level? At age 24?
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    Probably because Robbie Grossman is a starting outfielder for us right now? We don't exactly have much depth there.
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    What's Enns going to do? He's behind the current 5 starters, plus Mejia, plus possibly Gonsalves, plus Ervin Santana and Trevor May hopefully in the not too distant future. They are both probably DFA fodder, but Magill is perhaps a little more useful at the present moment.
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    Yup. Pretty sure Enns was going to be waived by the Yankees shortly thereafter anyway.
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    Rule 5 trades like that are pretty rare, I think. I don't think Kinley is worth enough for the Twins to offer much, but he's also useful enough as a non-40-man depth piece for the Marlins not to give him away either.
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    A negative impact is a type of impact. Seriously, Petit might be useful, if we had someone to pinch hit for Adrianza.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    Retroactive to April 28!
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    Well, I don't have a lot of confidence in Buxton turning our season around while he is playing through that pain either.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    You do realize those guys (Buxton, Santana, Polanco) aren't coming back for at least a month or two, right? I mean, I'm not freaking out or writing off the season or anything. But we're not turning anything around with the help of Buxton, Santana, or Polanco until May 30, at least. Hence why "it's only April 30" and "Buxton, Santana, and Polanco will return" are somewhat imcompatible reassurances.
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    But those 3 things aren't going to be fixed for at least another month or two, which sort of invalidates the "it's only April 30" reassurance...
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    I think they've already confirmed/announced Hughes as the starter for Wednesday this week, unfortunately.
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