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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    FWIW, Adrianza just hit the 5 year service time threshold yesterday. That effectively means his salary is guaranteed, and he doesn't have to accept a minor league assignment either even if he clears waivers. So if they wanted him off the 40-man roster, but also wanted to keep him in the organization, they should have done it yesterday. I have to imagine he would have cleared waivers. He's almost 30, with no options, and as noted, he is hitting poorly (even if it's largely a low BABIP). And he's even making more than double the minimum salary ($1.3 mil). For his career, he has 937 PA, and he's been worth 0.8 bWAR / 1.5 fWAR over that time. And almost all of that is positional/replacement adjustment -- he's -30 Rbat and only +1 Rfield compared to average.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    Ryan Pressly set the Astros franchise record for consecutive scoreless innings the other night. He's up to 33 dating back to last August. (He has allowed 4 inherited runners to score during that time, if you want to put an asterisk by his record. )
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    As of this date last year, Reed had faced 70 batters; Pressly 73. Rogers has faced 71 so far in 2019. Do you think he has been overused? I guess Rogers has 2 less appearances, so that's a few less warm-up pitches. But I'd hesitate to draw any direct lines about these usage patterns.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    Perhaps, but I hope not, if Kirilloff is healthy and raking. Raley looks like a variation of Daniel Palka -- not necessarily a bad player, useful under some circumstances, but not a player you should promote ahead of an elite prospect when wins actually matter.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    Keep in mind the International League is going through an offensive explosion right now. Raley's raw OPS of .866 there is his highest at any minor league level above rookie league so far -- but by wRC+ (his hitting relative to league), he's actually worse in 2019 (118) than he was at any level in 2017 or 2018 (129, 123, 133). A 118 wRC+ isn't bad, but from a 24 year old corner player in AAA, with a higher BABIP and mediocre K and BB rates, it's pretty marginal.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    Option years generally aren't a factor with elite prospects. You're not going to use all of them anyway unless their performance/value plummets. That said, option years are even less of an issue for Kirilloff, because according to Jeremy, Kirilloff would get 4 option years if called up in 2019, as opposed to the standard 3 option years if called up in 2020 or later: http://twinsdaily.com/_/minnesota-twins-news/minnesota-twins/finer-points-options-part-two-the-fourth-option-r7741
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    Or the Twins weren't yet interested in paying him the market rate... (edit: which was perhaps fair, given he was still roughly a year behind Severino/Nola in service time)
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    BP must be incorporating 2019 Pythag and/or BaseRuns a bit, where the Royals are notably better than their actual record so far (and by the same token, Cleveland's Pythag/BaseRuns records are worse). Fangraphs still only has KC, CHW, and DET with a combined 0.3% chance of winning the division, same as their preseason forecast. (Although using their mode that favors "Season to Date Stats", KC's chances climb to 7.3% -- again, must be the Pythag/BaseRuns effect.) EDIT: FWIW, BP had KC with a 3.1% chance of winning the division preseason. So they've at least fallen significantly from that, down to 0.6%. BP must use a bit more randomness in their simulations?
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    And again, very similar story at Fangraphs: Twins 53.6%, Cleveland 46.1%. (Preseason, Cleveland was 88.6% vs the Twins 11.1%.) https://www.fangraphs.com/standings/playoff-odds
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    Take it to the generic trade thread. I'm tired of everyone rehashing the Rob Wilfong trade on every thread around here!
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    I think sometimes the "trade tree" is overrated over time. Sure, the Twins got Ron Coomer for Kevin Tapani (and Mark Guthrie) 6 years after the Viola deal -- but absent the Viola deal, we probably would have acquired other players and made other trades, and wound up with Coomer or comparable players anyway. Barring exceptional circumstances, I don't think future deals beyond a few years should matter all that much in judging a trade. In any case, I'd say the Twins won this one. Viola was signed through 1991, and was very good in 1990, but we were well behind Oakland, and in 1991 Viola wasn't as sharp and we signed Morris for similar money anyway, plus had Tapani and Aguilera as key parts of our staff.
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    https://www.mlb.com/twins/roster/starting-lineups MIN Lineup Max Kepler (L) RF Jorge Polanco (S) SS Nelson Cruz (R) DH Eddie Rosario (L) LF C.J. Cron (R) 1B Marwin Gonzalez (S) 3B Jonathan Schoop (R) 2B Jason Castro (L) C Byron Buxton (R) CF Martin Perez (LHP) TOR Lineup Eric Sogard (L) 2B Freddy Galvis (S) SS Randal Grichuk (R) CF Justin Smoak (S) 1B Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (R) 3B Rowdy Tellez (L) DH Brandon Drury (R) RF Teoscar Hernandez (R) LF Danny Jansen (R) C Marcus Stroman (RHP)
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    Actually Polanco has spent very little time on the MLB bench. I only count ~21 days where he was in MLB but didn't start, over 2.5 seasons, until he started playing everyday at the 2016 trade deadline. And he was already on the 40-man roster before 2014, so we didn't waste option years by calling him up either. (We did mismanage his rookie league assignments in 2010, so he was ineligible for a 4th option year in 2017, but he ultimately turned his season around in MLB all right.)
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    No problem. I figured that was the case! It does sort of put some of these minor league stats in perspective when they will just release a guy who's putting up a good line (admittedly he's 28 years old, but still).
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't think this is a fair characterization. Gonzalez signed late this year (Feb. 25), but Cron, Schoop, Cruz, Parker, and Perez were all signed before February. Likewise for 2018, Pineda, Rodney, Duke, and Reed all signed by mid-January, even if we added Morrison/Lynn/Sanchez later. For 2017, Castro signed early too.
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    Anything you can share? LaVelle just said "a violation of team policy."
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    I mean, I guess we all hear things a bit differently. But I distinctly recall some instances like Chief is describing without any evident frustration from Gladden (just from the listener ). Or he'll describe a ball hit to the outfield, but not specify where or whether it's catchable in the air or not. You have to listen for further clues, like a description of advancing runners, to figure out what happened. He's not the regular PBP guy, so it's no big deal. I'm certainly not complaining, but I reserve the right to poke fun about it!
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't think it has anything to do with frustration. He just omits key details from his play-by-play at times, regardless of game state.
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    I'd guess most of us critical of the trade do not feel the return was "too good to turn down." I mean, by definition, every completed trade apparently features a return that is "too good to turn down" because, well, it wasn't turned down! Or maybe it was only "too good to turn down" under the assumption that Pressly would fail to sustain his good performance into 2019? That's my working theory, anyway.
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    Thanks, I remembered a little rough patch in June, but you're right, he was pretty good before that too. A K% of at least 31.8% every month, plus a solid ERA/FIP, that is pretty good, roughly on par with some fine seasons from Nathan, Neshek, Rincon, and Perkins.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    Veterans coming off surgery/absences don't seem to have season "innings limits" per se. Teams can exercise some caution around their usage, but they won't shut them down or change their role or anything unless they get hurt or really struggle, like most every pitcher.
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    The best announcers lets the listeners use their imagination!
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    The organization has never really made notable long-term investments in FA, beyond Nolasco/Santana (a class of FA SP that has perhaps disappeared?). I'm not sure the absence of such deals is much of a signal about anything. I mean, the team made the playoffs in 2017 (perhaps with a bit of good luck), and were only a few games out near the deadline in 2018 (perhaps with some bad luck). 28.7% odds to make the playoffs at Fangraphs before 2018, and 35.8% this year. Their two highest payrolls on record in 2018 and 2019 too. Obviously they weren't going "all in" on a World Series push or anything, but I think it's clear enough they were aiming at, and capable of, competing at a level where Pressly could be a real asset. It would be hyper-threading-the-needle to try to flip Pressly for prospects in that environment if they gave him good odds of continued success. Well, he wouldn't need to be *that* good to have provided good value for the Twins in 2019. Something more like his July 2018 stats with the Twins would have sufficed. I understand if they didn't believe he could keep that level up either -- but at the same time, I think it's also fair to point out that they possibly lost that bet. Teams lose bets like these all the time, even good teams. The good ones just win more bets than they lose, and/or they make the most of their wins and are able to minimize their losses. Hopefully we can do that in the pen yet this year.
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    FWIW, Pressly started dominating before he left the Twins, although perhaps only for a month or so: 14 G, 32.7 K%, 9.1 BB%, .204 AVG, .300 BABIP, 95.9 LOB% The Astros definitely refined that a bit further, especially in the control department -- here are his regular season stats with Houston since the trade: 39 G, 34.3 K%, 2.2 BB%, .143 AVG, .212 BABIP, 97.2 LOB% In some ways, trading Pressly at the deadline last year would be more like trading Martin Perez right now, after he's shown some flashes of success. I wonder what Wes Johnson could have done with Pressly?
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    Perhaps. Obviously there's more than one factor that goes into a decision, but I just don't get the impression that they had any particular disbelief in their ability to compete in 2019. And I also don't get the impression that Alcala/Celestino are so good to make this a can't-refuse deal if Pressly could really continue pitching like he did in July 2018. And I don't think they would be naive enough to assume we'd have an internal option who could replicate that level of performance that quickly. Hence, the primary factor, to me at this point in time, seems to have been a lack of belief in Pressly's chances of maintaining that effectiveness. Which isn't perhaps unwarranted, given the volatility of relievers and Pressly's own career arc, but it may be a bet that we lose.
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