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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    Polanco is potentially under contract through 2025 too.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    Those two full years only include about 7 baseball months. And look at that sOPS+ column -- 89/90 isn't great but for middle infielder, it's not bad. If Simmons had an OPS+ like that in 2021, we probably would have gotten a decent prospect for him. Polanco's not great defensively so I'd call it a little below average from him. So in 7 baseball months, by sOPS+, Polanco was great in 1 month, a little below average in 3, and further below average to bad in the remaining 3. Overall a little below average for that span -- Fangraphs says 88 wRC+, 2.0 WAR over those 7 months, 790 PA: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=0&type=8&season=2021&month=1000&season1=2019&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=13152&startdate=2019-06-01&enddate=2021-04-30 That actually seems somewhat encouraging if that's his selective endpoint / injury hobbled downside. (Bookended by 5 months and counting of outstanding hitting.)
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    I'm not so sure about this characterization of Scherff. I don't think he's a likely Rule 5 pick but he would appear to have a chance, which probably contributed to the Red Sox willingness to move him (as contenders, they have less incentive to protect a reliever in AA). The Red Sox actually gave Scherff a $700k bonus in the 2017 draft -- more than double his 5th round slot value. On paper, Scherff reminds me a bit of Ryan Pressly -- both drafted by the Red Sox out of a Texas high school. Both RHP about the same size. Both spent their first few pro seasons as unimpressive starters in the low minors before successfully switching to relief at AA in their last season before becoming Rule 5 eligible. Sisk would be the longer shot. He's left-handed, but he hasn't even fared well vs LHB in the minors this year, much less impressed much overall. 16th round pick after his junior season of college in 2018.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    SWR is 2022. Generally, guys who sign at 18 years old like he did in summer 2018 are eligible on the 5th Rule 5 draft after their signing, which would be December 2022.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    2021 has been rough, but it should be noted that Pineda, Maeda, and Odorizzi all had career-best performances as Twins under this FO and pitching coach. On the bullpen side, Rogers and May turned into pretty good late-inning relievers under them, and we got a couple outstanding seasons out of Duffey too and assorted pen guys like Clippard. Those guys are probably the most directly comparable to Shoemaker, as established MLB pitchers. Minor league development would be a separate issue and not really applicable to Shoemaker's complaints, although still a legitimate area of concern.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    I appreciate the effort, but that article is very old (2007), its data even older (2004-2006), and beyond that, it is just generally flawed: https://twinsdaily.com/forums/topic/49850-624-ops-spring/page/3/?tab=comments#comment-1017903 Fortunately, if you want to do your own research in that direction, there are great public tools available. I'd recommend the Fangraphs Splits Leaderboard, as its "position" split is by position played (not position qualified for, like some other Fangraphs pages), and it can also take custom date ranges, even spanning multiple seasons: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders/splits-leaderboards You'd probably need to copy and paste data into a spreadsheet to average the top 30 by PA at a given position (the PA filter only applies to the player list, not to the league-wide splits).
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    Nothing immediate, no.
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    "Comments that probably didn't need to be made"
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    And now, Shoemaker has been released:
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    We traded Aguilera twice, but only brought him back once (after the Frankie Rodriguez trade). He finished his career as a Cub after the Kyle Lohse trade. Of course, that still leaves him one trade and re-sign ahead of Pineda!
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    Why do you have to something? Surely if the offer is low enough, say another Beau Burrows requiring a 40-man roster spot or a random minor leaguer you have zero interest in, you're just better off passing. As it is, we have Barnes and Jax immediately re-joining the rotation.
  12. Otto von Ballpark
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    Looking around, it seems that every team that was shopping for SP got at least one, with the exceptions of San Diego, Tampa, and Boston. Those teams were rumored to be in on Scherzer and/or Berrios -- maybe they didn't want to give up much for a lesser tier of pitcher? San Diego and Tampa are no strangers to patching together a staff. St. Louis getting both Happ and Lester is a bit weird, but they're kind of a longshot -- they're probably just looking to patch things over until Flaherty returns. EDIT: San Fran was another team looking at Scherzer but probably not interested in anyone else (they've got a solid rotation right now).
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    Nah. I doubt he's bringing up this excuse outside of this article, where a reporter was specifically asking him to explain his early season struggles. And frankly these kinds of excuses are fairly common among pro athletes -- I'm sure every marginal journeyman could share some variation of it.
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    Shoemaker accepted his assignment on July 5th. I'm not sure many teams were terribly eager to accommodate him in their AAA rotation just a week before the draft -- I imagine a lot of "we'll get back to you" type responses. Meanwhile, the Saints opportunity was immediate. And frankly, if you are looking to crawl back to MLB yet this season, the Twins record and roster at the time probably made them one of the better opportunities for that.
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    I suspect he's searching for an excuse here, but if you read the article, it's far less damning than the headline suggests. I'm guessing Shoemaker talked about it with the Twins at the time of the DFA, and they agreed to give him the opportunity to pitch however he wanted in St. Paul without interference. We had immediate AAA innings available, and he had housing arranged in the Twin Cities already. That's much safer and more expedient than trying to latch on with a completely new org midseason after such a disastrous MLB performance. There was probably even an understanding that the Twins would release him to pursue a MLB opportunity elsewhere if one arose, if not promote him back to their own MLB roster. Presumably no one is going to ask him to pitch like he did in the first half ever again.
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    Wonder if they view Gant as a starter?
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    Shoemaker is always an option!
  19. Otto von Ballpark
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    Where would Story play for the White Sox? They are set at SS and 3B, and just acquired Cesar Hernandez for 2B yesterday.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    Gio Gonzalez is the name that jumped into my mind. Edit: maybe players named Gonzalez as more likely to be exceptions...
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    This is what evaluators do. No one can see every prospect in the country every month. And they're constantly incorporating new information into their evaluations as they receive it. Why shouldn't they? It's the same thing pro scouts do. No one is locked into giving the exact same rank/evaluation as 5 months ago. And moving from 40 to 59 isn't exactly a death sentence for the guy. It's actually relatively minor, as far as prospect rank movements go. If that bothers you, it's probably best not to pay any attention to prospect rankings at all.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    BTV uses Fangraphs valuations as part of their formula, and I know BTV updates them monthly around this part of the season. Why shouldn’t they update, with new information?
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    I don’t think there is any reason to suspect anything nefarious from Fangraphs. Prospect evaluators have been overwhelmed the past few weeks with the draft — I think BA hadn’t even published most of their midseason lists yet. Besides, preseason 40 (with zero pro experience) to midseason 59 is not a huge shift — basically just a value step down from 55 to 50 FV.
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    Shortstops can often move to other positions successfully.
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