Jump to content
Twins Daily
  • Create Account

Otto von Ballpark

Old-Timey Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    20,662

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    74

 Content Type 

Profiles

News

Minnesota Twins Videos

2026 Minnesota Twins Top Prospects Ranking

2022 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks

Minnesota Twins Free Agent & Trade Rumors, Notes, & Tidbits

Guides & Resources

2023 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks

The Minnesota Twins Players Project

2024 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks

2025 Minnesota Twins Draft Pick Tracker

Forums

Blogs

Events

Store

Downloads

Gallery

Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    To be fair, I suspect the cash is roughly the equivalent of the waiver fee.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    Although Nunez too was DFA'd at the time. It is quite possible that we could have acquired him even without Sulbaran, using any number of interchangeable assets. It is quite likely we could have instead acquired Nunez for, say, Tyler Jones. Not that I have any problem with the Butera trade, but giving it credit for Nunez and then Mejia is probably overstating it (even if it is technically true in a transaction tree sense).
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    Sometimes the team resists sending out guys without options, that's all. Not a big deal, but this is different than getting a non-40 man guy like, say, Miguel Sulbaran. Another difference is that Chapman is eligible to become a minor league free agent after the season if not added to the 40-man roster, which might nudge the team to call him up this season for evaluation purposes even if he doesn't necessarily deserve it.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    And while Chapman not being on the 40-man is nice, the Twins actually have an open 40-man spot with Tonkin removed. And if we add Chapman at any point, he is out of options which might limit our flexibility.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    Actually Santana wasn't claimed -- he was never waived. Likely he would have been claimed by a couple clubs, though, and the Braves offered Chapman to essentially jump the line.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    Chapman was available to us twice on waivers back in March. The second time he cleared completely, which is why Atlanta was able to outright him off their 40-man.
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    It's generally considered that hitting to pitching would be much easier. You can take a long time off the mound and come back to it successfully (Matt Bush being a recent example), but I'm not sure if you can put down the bat for years and come back so easily. Rick Ankiel did it, but just barely -- in the NL, he was getting reps at the plate throughout, and he had a pretty severe drop-off on the mound that prompted the switch.
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    The Twins signed Alexander Smit for $800k back in 2002. It certainly was not a regular amateur outlay for the club, but they had done it before, and in Europe, no less. Actually Polanco at $750k may have been our record signing for Latin America, at least until Sano was inked a couple months later.
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    FYI, Sano already had the nickname "Bocaton" ("big mouth" in Spanish).
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    If he's got an 18.6% BB rate and a .367 ISO, he doesn't need BABIP to be dominant. http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2017&month=0&season1=2006&ind=1&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=49868&players=0&sort=18,d
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    Usually those kind of deals only go to veterans later in their careers:
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    Hunter Greene is having a pretty underwhelming season at the plate, according to Max Preps: http://www.maxpreps.com/athlete/hunter-greene/uMJm9ZrFEeOzMAAmVebBJg/gendersport/baseball-stats.htm He was better in previous seasons, though. Would he really be a top-10 draft pick if he didn't pitch? Admittedly I'm not a HS baseball or draft follower....
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    Canceled because of prom? Think of it like a Axe Body Spray rainout.
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    Wasn't there a recent scouting tweet that Turley had significantly improved his velocity this year?
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    You could have said the same thing about Nick Tepesch a couple days ago. Or, frankly, Michael "Walking DFA" Tonkin. We've got an 8 man bullpen, and not a particularly strong one, there are plenty of opportunities to evaluate new players like Turley if they warrant it. I'd probably get Turley in AAA immediately, and if his success carries over, get him up to MLB. He's not the kind of player you make repeat his success for X number of months at a level before his next challenge.
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    This is incorrect. Polanco spent only 11 days in MLB combined from 2014-2015.
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    It's actually a really nice redesign at Baseball Reference, if you give it a chance! You should see the Splits links in roughly their old location, under the Summary section near the top. On desktop, you will see the "Splits" drop down link right there, and on mobile, you have to tap "More Polanco Pages" to show it (and the game logs, minors, HR log, etc.). On desktop, you should see a banner under the summar
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    It's mostly defense (which makes sense, given how little he has reached base). His UZR/150 right now is an insane 48.1. Buxton is a fantastic defender, but that's likely some small sample size noise -- for comparison, Billy Hamilton is also well-regarded and has a comparably outstanding 42 UZR/150 right now -- but in 3 previous season, he's never finished with even half of that. Even as an elite defender, Buxton will probably finish about 10-20 runs, or 1-2 wins, lower than his current defensive pace, which is a gap he's going to have to make up at the plate soon if he wants to maintain his replacement level status (much less improve to average).
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    FWIW, Buxton's performance at the plate is still worse than these other guys: http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=0&type=8&season=2017&month=0&season1=2017&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=14161,18314,15172,13185,13593,12564,14162&sort=17,d
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    Even for his career, though, Gibson has an 86 ERA+, 89 since his rookie season, and hasn't racked up a great deal of innings either. He seems more like a home-grown Correia or Pelfrey in terms of overall effectiveness. The fact that he's still not stepping up from the level of performance at age 29 is concerning, even if his peripherals haven't fallen off. I have no issue with saying Buxton is more more concerning, of course, and probably Hughes too.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    I am sure there was some more/better info and video later, but I'm not sure it's that huge of a difference in modern MLB. It might be a factor, but it might be a fairly minor one compared to the larger simple variances in player's approach/execution.
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't know if I'd say he came out of nowhere. It's not like he skipped the upper minors or came straight from Cuba or Japan. His worst start that year was his MLB debut. His last two starts that year were against teams he previously faced, and he did just fine. Neither of those facts fit neatly into a "lack of scouting report" theory. He also started 2016 with 4 solid starts in MLB, 3 of which came against teams he previously faced in 2015 (with 2 of those coming against the teams he faced twice in 2015). It's worth noting that Duffey was dealing in 2015, minors and majors, to an extent that he had never done previously or since. Even before his MLB debut, his 2015 minor league marks of 0.1 HR/9, 7.8 H/9, and 8.0 K/9 were all career bests. I suspect that, like many other players, he has difficulty executing and repeating his best approach. I'd like to see him get a bit more of a chance to try as a starter, although I am certainly not closing the book on him in relief -- he's 26 years old with 2 option years left, there is plenty of time to get back to a relief role if need be.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    Not really, the roster expansion is rarely a stark dividing line for most teams and positions. Duffey faced pretty much regular lineups over his 10 starts that year.
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    I'd guess this stat is better than saves/holds, but it still feels pretty arbitrary and limited, and even more complex. If we don't really care about calculating it in real-time, why not just use WPA or WPA/LI? Or even Fangraphs' Shutdowns and Meltdowns?
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    I think Santiago could continue to out-perform his FIP. But right now in 2017, he's out-performing it by almost two runs. And it's also a career-low FIP by almost a run too. (And in fairness to Thrylos, he was citing xFIP, and Santiago's 2017 HR rate is only 38% of his career rate, and only 30% of his 2016 rate.) This isn't a FIP issue, it's a small sample / peripherals issue.
×
×
  • Create New...