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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    Appreciate the take! We ran out of pitchforks anyway.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    Any Mega Man 3 fans in the house?
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    We pick on the Cleveland outfield, but after this trade, the Twins and Indians active roster outfield performances are exactly 111 wRC+ in 2019 (and this includes Yasiel Puig's bad start in Cincinnati): https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=0&type=1&season=2019&month=43&season1=2019&ind=0&team=0,ts&rost=1&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2019-01-01&enddate=2019-12-31&sort=16,d Although the Twins still have an advantage in outfield defense, of course!
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    Graterol, perhaps. I suspect he'll have to make a few appearances above the GCL first, though! Colina actually isn't Rule 5 eligible until after the 2020 season, so I wouldn't expect to see him this year. Now obviously, if they really think he's the best guy to potentially pull a K-Rod in September/October, go ahead, but it's hard to predict that with much confidence! Duran might have the next best case -- like Graterol, he will require a 40-man spot this offseason anyway.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    Yes. Yes, it is.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    FWIW, I think Littell's 10 days on optional assignment were up after Wednesday July 31st, since he was optioned before the game on July 22nd. So they could have flown Littell to Miami on Wednesday night, planning for him to be active for the Thursday noon game, rather than rush Dyson into town on Thursday morning. (Not that they really needed Littell or Dyson for the game, given how rested most of the pen was.)
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    Well, we've got an 8 man pen as of now, and Littell and Smeltzer aren't in it, but Stashak still is. (I suspect Littell may come up today and replace Stashak, though.) Is it time to give Littell a more permanent spot (May's?) and keep rotating guys through the Stashak spot?
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    Actually this deal highlights how trades can still be made, even after the July 31st deadline has passed -- they can only involve guys currently playing on minor league contracts (non-40 man players who haven't been outrighted off the 40-man already this year). Yes, this includes fungible minor league vets like Barnes, but also some prospects! Now, I don't think you'll see guys like Graterol or Kirilloff traded for each other this month, but if some other team has a pre-call-up version of Stashak, Poppen, Eades, or Smeltzer, they can still be dealt in August.
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    For May's own good, but is it for the Twins/Baldelli's own good? Would we rather have acquired an additional reliever at the deadline? Or have one of Littell/Thorpe/Stashak/Smeltzer/Poppen/Stewart up here a bit more often?
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    More frequent would be recent Twins relievers imploding their *last* time out: Parker - 0.1 IP, 4 R Magill - 1 IP, 6 R Morin - 1 IP, 4 R Mejia - 0.2 IP, 3 R Adams - 0.2 IP, 5 R Romero - 0 IP, 2 R Hildenberger - 0.1 IP, 3 R And of course, De Jong, Vasquez, and Adrianza count in this group too. Hopefully Romero and Hildenberger (and not Adrianza) eventually get the opportunity for a better send-off.
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    Debuts in relief for the Twins this year, before Dyson: Romo - scoreless inning Stashak - 2 scoreless innings Thorpe - 2.2 IP, 1 R (relief debut, after 5 IP, 2 R starting debut) Poppen - 4 IP, 3 R Eades - 2 scoreless innings Stewart - 4 scoreless innings (although he was a "primary pitcher" after an opener a few times last year) Smeltzer - 4.1 IP, 1 R (relief debut, after 6 IP, 0 R starting debut) Adams - 2 scoreless innings Morin - 2 IP, 1 R Parker - 1 IP, 1 R Harper - 1 scoreless inning I don't know if they count as implosions: Perez - 3.2 IP, 3 R (we were up 8-0 at the time) Romero - 2 IP, 3 R (we were up 15-4 at the time) The only previous "implosion" Twins relief debut this year would seem to be: De Jong - 1 IP, 4 R And of course, Adrianza's 3 runs in 1 IP. You're probably thinking of Andrew Vasquez too -- 3 runs without recording an out (just like Dyson!) in his lone 2019 appearance, although it wasn't his Twins pen debut -- he pitched for us a bit last year as well. If you count him, you probably also need to count Mejia (0.2 IP, 0 runs in 2019 debut, after 1 game in relief last year) and Littell (2 scoreless innings in 2019 debut, after a few games in relief last year). In any case, I guess Dyson's best Twins reliever debut performance comps are currently Vasquez, De Jong, and Adrianza. That's comforting.
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    De Jesus, not De Aza.
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    No options left for Trevor May.
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    FWIW, the Yankees bullpen was already better than ours, and they hope to get Betances and Severino back yet this season. They could do some extreme bullpenning this postseason! The Yankees probably should have added a starter, though. Our rotation has been better overall, but some of that difference is some crazy recent results (plus those crazy games in London). I wouldn't expect Tanaka to give up 12 runs in a postseason game. Through July 21st, the Twins rotation had an advantage, with 79/88/95 ERA-/FIP-/xFIP-, but the Yankees were still respectable at 90/97/94. Even now, the Yankees are basically even with us in xFIP-, 94 to 96.
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    Yes, I'll edit. Although assuming we're not in the wild card game, I guess a .500 record in series-ending games could at least get us to the ALCS?
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    112 wRC+ in AAA doesn't mean much. The outfielders that Cleveland has promoted from Columbus this year posted 215, 180, 165, 129, and 99 marks at that level (admittedly in some small samples). And the guy with the 99 wRC+ is 7 years younger than Barnes and possibly more capable in CF (and he had a 133 mark at AAA last year). Actually, the outfielders Cleveland settled on haven't been that bad -- of their top 5 outfielders by PA, they've got Mercado with a 107 wRC+ in MLB this year, Naquin 105, Luplow 120. Compare that to the Twins, with Kepler 129, Rosario 110, Buxton 110, Gonzalez 91, and Cave 72. Cleveland was really hurt by the leash they gave to Leonys Martin (61) and Jake Bauers (79), although to be fair Martin had a 103 in MLB last year with plus CF defense, and Bauers had a 95 as a MLB rookie last year and is only 23 years old, so they probably deserved some leash. Both Martin (released) and Bauers (optioned) are gone now. Looking at Rochester outfielders, Jaylin Davis had a 173 wRC+, De Aza from the indy leagues has a 162 already, Cave 144... obviously not much room for them in the Twins outfield, but this puts Barnes's 112 in the same league in further context.
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    Another opportunity to show the juiced ball context of AAA in 2019: Barnes has an .865 OPS at AAA this year -- but relative to league, it's only a 112 wRC+ per Fangraphs. Last year, he only had a .791 OPS in the same league -- but it was a 124 wRC+. His OPS jumped 74 points, while his wRC+ fell 12 points...
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    A trend which hopefully changes before the postseason!
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    The Twins have been very aggressive lately about shuttling pitchers to/from Rochester (and DFA). I suspect they saw an opportunity here, after Poppen pitched Wednesday night, to shuttle him out and have Dyson available for Thursday, but it was probably A. a tight squeeze, given it was a noon game Thursday and Dyson wasn't flying until the morning B. unnecessary, given that Poppen and Rogers were the only relievers who pitched on Wednesday night. I get that there can be an advantage to shuttling in fresh pitchers -- but when you have an 8-man bullpen, there's also an advantage in that you shouldn't *always* have to shuttle guys. We still had 6 relievers with a full day's rest heading into Thursday's game, without Dyson. (And 4 of those had at least 3 days worth of rest, 3 with 4+ days rest, and one -- Thorpe -- with a 5 days rest, now up to 6 days rest...)
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    He's barely pitched in a fortnight...
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    Yup, Pressly is on the DL but should be back soon. Neshek too, and not so soon... plus David Hale Juan Graterol
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    I know he never made the majors for the Twins, but Nick Anderson is solidly "ex-Twins org", and is now in the pen of a contender (Tampa). Dereck Rodriguez (SF) is in this group too. As is Nick Burdi (Pirates 60-day DL). I'm fine with not counting Steve Pearce, though.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    Not sure if most would describe Philadelphia to Miami as "cross country" but I guess it sort of does go across most of the country, vertically.
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    Not to harp on this, but if there was any chance we want Dyson to pitch in the Thursday noon game, why didn't we fly him in on Wednesday night? Trade was finalized at 4 PM, Dyson was already on a road trip in Philadelphia. The Giants game went past 10 PM, surely they could have gotten him into Miami by that time? Otherwise, if it's customary to give a guy the evening off on the day of a trade or something, why fly him down to Miami on Thursday morning, just to fly him back to Minneapolis on Thursday afternoon?
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    Not sure if that is an accurate summary of MacPhail's philosophy. We paid for Blyleven, Reardon, Morris, Smiley -- even Tapani and Aguilera, in a way. On the hitter side, we bought Chili Davis, then Dave Winfield at the end... Although it is interesting to remember that even Torii Hunter was drafted under MacPhail!
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