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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    Hughes could have made a rehab start in the minors, just not on the Twins preferred date.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    That would be really unusual usage. This isn't getting his feet wet as a backup for month, he has been in the role for almost 5 months now, after only a month at AAA. I can't think of any modern day top prospects deployed in that manner. They are using him like a Rule 5 pick.
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    Actually, according to Seth he hasn't really acclimated to AAA despite a .400 AVG (.500 BABIP!). To be fair, he's hardly had a chance to play there yet, though.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    Teams generally use 4 starters in the playoffs now anyway, even with the travel days. If a manager wants to stick his neck out and try to ride a horse like Kershaw on 3 days rest, I find that interesting and not a practice worth squashing.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    Also, MLB didn't unilaterally impose the new postseason ban. The MLBPA had to agree to it.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    The problem wasn't announcers talking about Nelson Cruz. The problem was that like suspensions were effectively treated differently. Why should a player that tests positive in July be effectively banned from the postseason too, but a player testing positive in late June still make it in? Or maybe even more importantly, why should a player testing positive in late May have plenty of time to appeal and still return for the playoffs, but a player testing positive in late June would have no time margin for appeal? (Think of the players that bargained with MLB over Biogenesis in 2013 -- how many of them were pressured into accepting suspensions just so they wouldn't jeopardize their postseason availability?) The new system removes all of that ambiguity, which in the big picture is good both for the teams AND the players. Sucks for Ervin Santana and the Twins, but next winter maybe he will think twice before he gets an untraceable Dominican supplement shot. All 80 game suspensions are essentially equal now, 80 games plus any postseason games during that season.
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    And there you save 2 days. If that's the biggest problem, that the postseason is 2 days too long, it's probably a pretty good setup. It is a different dynamic than a 162 game season, and there's nothing wrong with that. You get to enjoy the 162 game season with 5 man rotations and backup catchers, then you get to enjoy a postseason tournament focused more on aces and starters. As a Twins fan, I am pleased as punch that Allan Anderson and Joe Niekro didn't have to start postseason games in 1991 and 1987.
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    One thing to note about Trout, although he struggled in his initial call-up in 2011, he showed some good power (.170 ISO), which was a harbinger of his future stardom. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like Buxton is showing much of anything at the plate these days (although his K rate has decreased the past couple weeks, that's a start). Not necessarily cause for panic, but it does make it hard to see into his future.
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    Don't know about GB data, but his K rate has drops from 18.4% to 11.6% in DP situations (runner on 1st, less than 2 out). His slash line in such situations, .260/.339/.438, .777 OPS, is pretty similar to his overall numbers of .250/.312/.443, .755 OPS.
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    Even adjusting for opportunity, Plouffe has been bad at DP avoidance this year. He's "delivered" on 24% of DP opportunities, according to John. League average is 11%. More meaningfully, you would want to look at who the baserunners are. Plouffe has hit behind Vargas, then mostly Mauer, and now Sano. I don't know if that is notably worse than who he has hit behind previously, though.
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    Yeah, I don't mind most of Selig's schedule/postseason changes, except this one (and its cousin interleague play). I really liked seeing league teams more often in the regular season, and enjoyed extra late-night west coast baseball as well as earlier-evening east coast baseball. The interleague novelty, and tons of division "rivalry" games have just never appealed to me.
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    To MLB's credit, they have eliminated the silly mid-series, non-travel off days in recent years. Again, this has never been done in baseball, dating back to the start of divisional play in 1969. It's not really a matter of sharing stadiums, or even TV (although TV has plenty of control), it's the logistics of trying to plan and carry out major events. You need more than 1 day advance notice to staff a stadium, for example. Imagine the Twins finishing off an ALCS sweep on Oct. 20 this year, knowing they are going to host World Series Game 1... but not yet knowing whether it will be Oct. 23, 24, 25, 26, or 27 (or possibly later, depending on NLCS weather), and only getting 1 day notice when the date is final. It's just not practical. As it is, the Twins already know exactly which days they will host potential games for the entire postseason (aside from weather delays, which they deal with in the regular season too). They can make all of the arrangements now, contingent only on their postseason qualification and advancement (and "if necessary" games are much easier to deal with than "we don't know if OR when the heck this is happening" games). (And yes, I have worked in stadium concessions, so I am the world's foremost expert on this subject )
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    The one-game playoff doesn't determine the champion, it determines the wild card from two teams, based on their 162 game season record, that gets to participate in the postseason championship tournament. I can't see how the "ruins the integrity" line could logically be drawn between having a wild-card in the postseason, and having two teams play one game to determine the wild-card in the postseason. The 1969 and 1994 postseason realignments were orders of magnitude larger than the 2012 one.
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    Oh, I haven't forgotten it (or Griffey's throw to the plate -- arg), but in terms of national importance as a factor in adding the wild card game for 2012 as Seth suggested, I think the 2008 tiebreaker's contribution is about zero.
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    Hedges was #23 by Baseball Prospectus. #51 by MLB.com, and unranked by BA (dropping him from #27 the previous year to completely out of their top 100). Not sure what that means. The fact that the Padres have utilized him as a sparingly-used backup this year, after only a month of AAA time, suggests they're not super-high on him either.
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    Jeremy, given your previous reporting on the Twins-Padres rumors/talks, I get the impression that you are presenting mostly speculation and inference as "serious discussions" here, in regards to Shields and Kimbrel (and previously Tulo): http://twinsdaily.com/articles.html/_/minnesota-twins-news/they-couldn’t-could-they…-r3985 I am not sure that this level of "discussion" is even meaningful at all, in terms of gauging trade likelihood. I guess it's hard to tell until you and source have more of a track record in this arena, but that's my impression right now...
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    Sure, but there is nothing magic about those dates. The odds of a major snowstorm hitting Minneapolis are about the same on Oct. 27, 31, and Nov. 4. The fact that the postseason has shifted by a week at its most extreme (late season start) since then has not meaningfully increased the chances of cold-weather or snow baseball. You'd probably have to go back to pre-division play (pre-1969), or shorten the regular season, to get a meaningful reduction in the chances of cold-weather or snow baseball. I, for one, would not make that trade. More baseball, please!
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    Not a fatal flaw, but DP avoidance can certainly be a skill and/or a mark of good performance. At B-Ref right now, Plouffe is 6 runs above average with the bat, but that gets wiped out by him being 2 runs below average on the bases and 4 runs below in DP avoidance. It matters.
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    And as I mentioned above, a 3 game series completely misses the point of the wild card game. It guarantees a "win or go home" game (actually two, one for each league) every year. Despite having 7 series, the MLB postseason is not immune to droughts of such excitement. 2005-2010, over 6 postseasons, there were only 5 such games, and no more than 1 per year (with none in 2009). Even adding in the 3 tiebreaker games during that time, there was a lot of unmemorable October baseball those years. The excitement of the 2011 regular season finish and postseason showed how exciting (and profitable) those kind of games can be, and I still think that was the primary reason for the change.
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    I am sure TV has a hand in it, but having a predetermined schedule is actually beneficial to everybody. (Imagine how hard it is to arrange staff to work in the stadium when every future game could occur on one of 4 possible dates, and you won't know which date until maybe 1-2 days beforehand.) It's not new to baseball either -- looking all the way back to 1969, the first year of divisional play, the World Series started 5 days after the conclusion of both LCS's (which were both sweeps). The long layoffs are potentially multiplied with longer playoffs, but there really isn't a practical way to do it otherwise.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    The 1991 World Series ended on October 27, and the 2015 World Series -- the latest ever, I think, due in part to a late start to the regular season -- is scheduled to run through Nov. 4. There isn't a meaningful difference in expected/predicted weather between those two dates. Day games might be nice, especially on weekends, although I admit it would be harder for me to watch them on TV. I honestly don't care about the temperature, though -- it's more baseball!
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    The 2009 game was a contributing factor, perhaps, as well as the Padres-Rockies tiebreaker in 2007, although I think the Twins 2008 tiebreaker is largely forgotten. And note that there wasn't much of a push to add the wild card game before the 2010 or 2011 seasons. I think the primary impetus was the ultra-exciting final day of the 2011 season, with a number of teams in win-or-go-home games. (Although ironically, the drama of that day would have been severely lessened if the wild card game had been in effect that year.) Plus the 2011 World Series game 7, the first of its kind in 9 years, showed again how captivating the "win or go home" game can be. I think MLB wanted to guarantee that kind of a day every year, regardless of how the regular season finished or the rest of the postseason unfolded.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    Not necessarily at that frequency. It is a real skill for some players. Relates to speed, contact, GB/FB.... heck, some guys can probably change their approach in DP situations just like they can in sac fly situations.
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    Logan Darnell still exists, right? I don't mean to bring up Berrios again, but this is another situation where he could have potentially been helpful. (Allowing us a short hook for any scuffling/injured/rehabbing starter.)
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    Think you are underestimating how much it would push the playoffs back. Right now, they have 3 scheduled days off between the end of the regular season and start of the division series. That covers a day for travel/tiebreakers/weather, a day for the wild card game, and then an extra failsafe day for travel/tiebreakers/weather. Your "best of 3" would take up all 3 days with no allowance for travel/tiebreakers/weather. Short version: it would add 2 games, but it would almost certainly add more than 2 days to the postseason if you want to keep the rest of the postseason schedule intact. And one of those games/days would be "if necessary" which would be a silly way to hold up the rest of the postseason. I think you are generally missing the point of the wildcard game if you think it should be best of 3. That's not a wild card game anymore, that is an extra round of the postseason.
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