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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    We had one above-average starter last season, and more or less one each season since 2011. If we suddenly have 3 of them in 2015 before even considering Nolasco (or the hyper-competitive 5th spot), we will be all right. Maybe not leading the division, but probably .500.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't think the Andrus thing applies to Dozier, yet. The Rangers had already bought out Andrus's arb years -- that's what we are discussing doing now in regards to Dozier. The bad contract part was when the Rangers tacked a huge extension onto the end of their arb buyout deal. At worst, we are talking about buying out a year or so of free agency on top of the arb years with Dozier, but that's very different from how the Rangers dealt with Andrus.
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    An Anthony Swarzak type won't lead the league in appearances -- that's going to be a higher leverage reliever. Relief innings, perhaps, but they will mostly be low leverage, so an "upgrade" in performance during them isn't very exciting, particularly with big performance questions remaining in our rotation and top of the bullpen.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    This is what bugs me about the Stauffer signing. We didn't have that great of a bullpen last year, and our biggest offseason bullpen upgrade is already projecting as a Swarzak replacement.
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    To be fair, a torn meniscus is much less severe than an ACL tear. The latter sidelined Martinez for a full season a couple years ago (and prompted the Prince Fielder mega-contract). Recovery time for a torn meniscus could be as little as 4-6 weeks. He might miss opening day, but they don't necessarily need to acquire a season-long replacement this time.
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    I wouldn't read too much into "#3 starter" type projections. Obviously the quality of a #3 starter varies by the quality of the staff/team. And nobody agrees much on "ace" criteria (are aces the top 30 starters in MLB? 15? 45?) so I wouldn't expect much agreement on other rotation spots either. Meyer could achieve this hypothetical "#3 starter" level and still be an acceptable #1-2 on many clubs, easily on this Twins club, and especially if he can reliably repeat that performance.
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss 2011. His poor 2009 season was virtually identical to his 2011 one. And even his two good years share many common peripherals with his bad ones -- basically those two years he shaved off about 1 H/9 and 0.5 HR/9, which is obviously good but doesn't strike me as a skill given the rest of his record. By xFIP (which normalizes HR/FB rate), he's basically been the same pitcher his entire career.
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    I don't think this list is market-based. Zobrist? Neil Walker? I think it is current performance level AND track record of achieving that level. Dozier has a much shorter track record than just about everyone in front of him, with the possible exception of Altuve (who probably gets a bonus for winning a batting title with a 6 WAR season). Now, factor in age/contract and Dozier could move past a couple more guys, but I don't think that's a criteria used here.
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    Maybe Pelfrey can throw naked batting practice?
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    Agreed. I think it's a bit of a chicken and egg scenario -- Michaels suggests that the noise caused the winning, but I'd argue that the winning caused the noise. Not only was the team (and city) coming off a long drought, the Twins were massively successful at home in the 1987 and 1991 playoffs. Remarkable as it seems, there was really nothing to damper the crowd's excitement at home those two years. They had Game 1 at home each series and jumped out to a series lead. Their only home loss was ALCS Game 2 in 1991, after which they promptly swept the next 3 in Toronto to take the series, more than enough to build excitement going into the World Series. By comparison, in 2002 they started on the road and had some shaky performances, then promptly lost their first home game that postseason (Rick Reed!). They recovered to survive a little bit longer that year, but it's plainly evident that any excitement was only dampened further by the 2003-2010 postseasons.
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    Given the Metrodome sound system, especially at the time, I don't know that it would have been very effective at pumping in crowd noise. Or, if they had tried at any decent volume, it would have sounded terrible and been immediately evident. I'll file this one right alongside Jim Leyland's theory about the air conditioner fans.
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    Last spring the competition was much less. Actually a few of the chief competitors (Worley & Diamond) had already been demoted to AAA the previous summer, and none of the options were guaranteed as much as Milone's $2.8 mil, much less Pelfrey's $5.5 mil. I think many of us under-rated Gibson's chances of making the team last spring. Doesn't mean this spring's prospects don't have a much harder hill to climb.
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    His career wRC+ was 134 entering the 2014 season. His best ~2 months of 2014 was 125. And even that small sample is worse than every full season of his since his first few years in the league, save for the 2011 lost season. 135 for 2015 is definitely on a limb, but I hope he does it too. In fairness to Mauer, he has scuffled with injury before and rebounded, but the last time was 3 years ago when he had a much lower K rate. (Maybe part of his comeback approach in 2012-2013 forced his K rate higher, which is fine, but that would cast doubt on whether he could successfully double down on that approach in 2015.)
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    Oh, I remember too. I just meant that the evidence suggests Antony was not a counter-balancing voice of reason against Gardy's sub-optimal preferences. Delmon might have been one of those too (if Gardy asked for a RH "run producer" to replace Hunter).
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    That second half 125 wRC+ is still notably worse than his career mark before the season (134), despite being aided by a walk rate and BABIP both higher than his career marks. And his second half .118 ISO compared to his 2013 mark of 153 would still represent his biggest single season drop outside of 2009-2010 and 2010-2011. Mauer's 2012-2013 seasons, while overall results were excellent, were also aided by above career average BABIP and BB% and in spite of skyrocketing K%. Remember, a big question a year ago was whether Mauer could sustain a .320 AVG and 140 wRC+ with a K% almost twice as high as his pre-2012 career mark. At this point, 2014 -- even just the second half -- is almost certainly a data point in favor of "no".
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    Or maybe Antony counseled Smith after 2010: "J.J. Hardy only had 38 RBI last year, I think we can safely dump him to bring in the speed that Gardenhire wants." Or at the trading deadline 2010: "Saves mean your team won, and Matt Capps has more career saves and 2010 saves than our entire bullpen combined!"
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    Except that the question posed to Antony wasn't about looking backward (which would be a pointless question anyway, akin to asking "Which team would you have rather had yesterday? The one that scored more runs, obviously.") Here is the context of the Antony RBI comment: I don't know about you, but I am imagining Rob Antony informing Bill Smith in November 2007: "Delmon Young had 93 RBI last year -- as a rookie!" Never mind that Young's ISO that year was lower than the Twins' Lew Ford, Garrett Jones, Jeff Cirillo, and the rotting shell of Rondell White. And worse than his Rays teammates Brendan Harris, Dioner Navarro, and Akinori Iwamura. Even Young's AAA ISO was notably worse than that of Garrett Jones. And since that point according to B-Ref, Young has produced 1 batting run above average versus Jones' 35, despite having more PA. (Young does have 5% more RBIs per PA, though!)
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    I think you can pencil it in -- that's why pencils have erasers, my friend. Seriously, we're talking about single season projections. There are so many qualifiers to all of them that a generic "+5% TJ risk" or whatever in any random season due to pitching mechanics is pretty trivial when you are talking about a guy who is presently in good health and made his last 22 starts last year (and was superb in them). Now, if you want to say the White Sox can't count on an annual 5 WAR from Sale over the next 5+ years, I agree. But I would agree to almost the same degree for any pitcher of that level.
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    Yeah, I am in the same boat. But that pretty much points to the single-game route being most cost effective, not any kind of ticket package (unfortunately for the Twins, I know). This plan is definitely better than the 20-gamer, don't get me wrong, and maybe will staunch the bleeding as those folks drop. But it's still not useful enough to me as, say, a full "flex" pack (pick any 5-10 games). Will TD still have its affiliation with Ticket King this season? I used them several times last year, got some fantastic padded dugout box seats for the same prices as the face value of these "Field Box" seats.
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    I am no pitching mechanics expert, so you may have a point on Sale, but this data does nothing to convince me. You've already cited Scherzer as a high risk in an above post, and now you're citing Adam Wainright, CJ Wilson, and AJ Burnett? These guys have proven to be some of the most durable in the league. You've got a long ways to go if you want to convince me that this pitching style is notably more prone to serious injury than the pitching population as a whole. At best, you might be looking at a couple percent increase in Sale's injury chances based on this alone, which is probably dwarfed by countless other factors.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    For those wondering, this looks like about a 10% discount over current face values for single game tickets. Better selection of games than the 20 game packs, for sure, but not sure if it's that great of a deal. The 20 game pack looks like approximately a 20% discount over single game face.
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    Craig Kimbrel has never had TJ surgery, so your list is down to 1 in 10 over 3 years... or almost exactly equal to your guesstimate 3.3%. And that list was published May 10, 2012. Here are the number of regular season days missed due to ANY injury by each of those pitchers since that date (according to Baseball Prospectus): Mitchell Boggs - 2 (lower back) Kelvin Herrera - 0 Craig Kimbrel - 6 Tim Lincecum - 1 (general illness) Carlos Marmol - 22 (thigh) Jason Motte - 262 (230 due to TJ surgery) Pat Neshek - 0 Chris Sale - 62 Max Scherzer - 22 (13 arm) Jordan Walden - 123 (58 arm) So out of ~5000 regular season days since then, these guys missed 500 days due to injury (and only 369 due to arm issues), most of it due to the one TJ guy. (Baseball Prospectus didn't note Herrera's sprain, but so far it was just one ALDS game that he missed for it.) Not sure if this proves anything.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    Seems like a small sample. He's got 6.8 K/9 in both his pro seasons as a starter. Below league average K/9 at every stop (save for his 3 starts in Rochester).
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    Sickels has them both C+. Even the Detroit Tigers have 20 C+ or better guys in their system right now, so I'd hardly say these two would be clear top 10's everywhere else.
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    A contributing factor in the historical view, but not really all that important to the recent explosion in game times: http://www.captainsblog.info/2014/10/25/for-love-of-the-game-mlb-should-go-slow-with-time-saving-measureslength-of-game-pitch-clocks-average-time-of-baseball-game/22197/
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