Peter Labuza

I think what you'll see as the stories continue this week is there are honestly much more egregious stories to tell than a half-truth.

This week at Twins Daily, we're running a five-part series detailing the history of the business ventures of the Pohlad family. Even as they prepare to sell the Twins after a 40-year ownership, it's an important subject, given the way they've left their stamp deep in the heart of the franchise. Image courtesy of JHansen23 - Wikimedia Commons - Cropped to Size "I've always bought and sold things. It's what I've done all my life. " —Carl Pohlad, 1989 Carl Pohlad could have bought any number of teams. He looked into buying the San Francisco Giants in the 1970s. He put down a bid to buy the Philadelphia Eagles in 1983. He later tried to buy Churchill Downs, the home of the Kentucky Derby. Instead, he ended up with a baseball team for the bargain price of $32 million. But why the Minnesota Twins? After all, Carl admitted he had “no particular interest in baseball.” Instead, like many things in his portfolio, it was seen as a savvy investment. As he told the press, “I think there is a good baseball market here and we can turn it around. In fact, I think we may already have.'' Cut to 40 years later, and baseball in Minnesota is in trouble. While almost every team in the league saw a notable increase in attendance in 2024, the Minnesota Twins saw their numbers dip. The causes are manifold, but the buck stops at the Pohlad Family, who have owned their baseball team longer than almost every other team in the league. That will likely come to an end this year, but before that, we need to understand how and why the Pohlads made the decisions they made. Baseball, the way it has been played at the major-league level for decades, is a business. And if it’s just one business among many for the owners of the local nine, we need to understand the other cogs in the machine. For more on the history of the Pohlad family and their business interests, please see Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5 of this series. This week on Twins Daily, we’re diving into the financial history of the Pohlads. If they are indeed on their way out—whether in favor of the Ishbia brothers, or elsewhere—we need to understand the origins of these frustrations. Baseball owners do not simply walk into the job (unless they are handed it on a silver plate). And the way they make their decisions needs to be understood in the context of their financial dealings. Over five parts, I’ll be tackling different aspects of the Pohlad empire: the successes, the failures, the swindles, the alternative paths. In many ways, the stories that pepper Pohlad’s non-baseball past are no different than those you might find in any owner’s past. But the lessons along the way here include this one: the Pohlads have never necessarily run any business in a typical manner. Seeing their actions in other businesses often reveals why the Twins have been run the way they were. Let’s get one story out of the way. It has become almost common lore that Carl Pohlad began his foray into business by, as many sources say, foreclosing on homes during the Great Depression. As much as naysaying Twins fans would love to believe such a story, there’s no evidence for that, beyond the slow accretion of repeated hearsay. Carl was born in 1915, making him only 14 when the stock market crashed in 1929. He was from a small town in Iowa and grew up poor; his father worked the railroad and attempted to support eight children. Young Pohlad did work for a bank, first on his farm, milking cows. By the mid-1930s, as ESPN’s Jim Caple reported, “He went on to deliver collection and foreclosure notices.” If Pohlad played the role of “muscle” for that banker, it's buried deeper than anyone has been able to reach for real proof; that idea has taken root purely through grapevine gossip. But even if it only included delivering notices, it certainly meant having people leave the same kind of farms his own family lived on. That said, there were very few honest dollars to go around. It was a hard time to live in a community (or thrive in a business) dependent upon agriculture. But Pohlad escaped, thanks to his body. He moved to Los Angeles where he played football at a junior college, while selling repossessed cars and boxing in his spare time. After being spotted by Bing Crosby, we went on to play for Gonzaga. Before he could go any further in any career, however, he was drafted in 1943. He fought in the European theater of World War II, and was eventually decorated with three Purple Hearts and two Bronze Stars. When he got home, Pohlad needed to get his money somewhere, so he did what all the best and brightest Americans do: he married into it, in 1947. His new brother-in-law Russell Stotesbury operated a business in Iowa that essentially taught banks how to manage their money better. Understandably, that was a hot consulting business, with the Great Depression only a few years in the rearview and a postwar boom changing the landscape rapidly. By 1949, the Pohlads relocated to Edina. Stotesbury passed away in 1955; Pohlad took full control of several banks, including Marquette Bank. Only a year later, Pohlad began participating in meetings across athletic clubs, yacht clubs, country clubs, all with the other bankers of the state. These meetings had a goal: to set standards across all banks to create a uniform way of doing things. That’s the official, sanitized way to say it. A better way to say it is: the banks were engaging in illegal price fixing. They were able to set interest rates without the pressure of competition, ensuring high savings for the banks and low returns to customers. Farmers were particularly hard-hit by high rates. Checking accounts were burdened by onerous service fees. And because both small and large banks across the state participated, no one had anywhere else to turn to get a better rate. Luckily, this was a time of aggressive antitrust action, and Robert F. Kennedy’s Department of Justice investigated the action in 1961. By that time, the 20 banks involved had grown to $392 million in assets (around $4.2 billion in 2024 dollars). In 1964, Pohlad and the other banks pleaded “no contest” to the case, resulting in fines of $253,000. Although Pohlad did not speak, another spokesman essentially admitted that banking was a special business, and the only way to actually make a profit and stay in business was to commit fraud. Pohlad himself later said, in a 1984 interview with Managing magazine, that “banks should be deregulated completely.” Due in some part to the banks’ collusion, between 1954 and 1964, Minnesota lost over 20,000 farms, most gobbled up by larger corporations receiving more preferential loans. The average farm grew 18% in size over the same years. In Filmore County, the almost 200 family farms in 1958 all but disappeared, purchased by speculators. This is, directly though not solely, a part of the Pohlad family's legacy in the state. There were many more possible indictments that loomed over the case, particularly on issues of discrimination. However, Congress had barred the Federal Trade Commission from pursuing further action when it came to this kind of discrimination. And if there were other skeletons, the creeping political conservative takeover of the 1970s would ensure they stayed in the closet. By the start of the 1980s, deregulation was in, and antitrust was out. Big Business was good. Through all of this, Pohlad found a way to continue to grow. You can’t commit illegal collusion with other bank owners if you own all the banks yourself. Pohald soon became known as the “dean of chain banking” (or, as one article described him, the “Mickey Mantle of Chain Banking”). Rather than combining all the banks into one parent company (ie. Wells Fargo, Citibank), Pohlad simply owned several separate banks, which Minnesota law allowed. While holding banks were regulated by the Bank Holding Company Act of 1956, chain banks were not. As a 1977 study demonstrated, chain banking “results in poorer market performance – i.e., higher prices and a lesser quality of bank services.” Michael Pint, the Minnesota banking commissioner from 1978 to 1982, put it plainly: “If the legislators decide there’s a reason to control the multibank holding companies, there’s a reason to control the chains.” There’s no evidence that Pohlad’s banks continued to participate in interest fixing as he swallowed banks whole. But he profited tremendously from a period of mass deregulation in the financial industry, in which adopting policies on both sides of the line between illegal and merely unseemly became the predominant way of doing business. By 1988, the 40 banks Pohlad owned accounted for around $4 billion in assets. When Pohlad sold Marquette Bank in 1992, it held over $2.4 billion in assets. Though many others held shares in the bank, somehow, most of the profits went to Pohlad. The minority owners sued for a greater share, and a settlement for $5 million was eventually reached. Pohlad’s last assets in banking were sold in 2001. The consolidation was considered so concentrated that the Bush administration required Wells Fargo to sell six branches across Minnesota and South Dakota so people could have access to competing banks. When Pohald arrived at Marquette Bank, rules prevented banks from merging, thus promoting small businesses and combating consolidation. But as Pohlad worked with other banks, he saw opportunities for growth and increased profitability. Some of those opportunities involved loopholes; others involved fraud. Most involved enrichment for a few at the cost of many. But that’s where Part One ends and Part Two will begin: What can we learn from Pohlad the businessman, rather than the banker? We’ll turn to how Pohlad has worked with the government to build something for the public. Spoiler Alert: It doesn't end well. View full article

The Twins will partner with MLB to produce and broadcast games in 2025, expanding their reach across Twins Territory and giving cable cutters a streaming option. But will people pay in? Image courtesy of © Matt Blewett-Imagn Images It's the announcement that feels finally a decade in the making: Minnesotans can finally stream Twins games. As the Bally Sports bankruptcy court threw a wrench in recent weeks, three teams—the Twins, Guardians, and Brewers—have officially partnered with MLB for broadcasts in 2025. This follows the same track that the Diamondbacks, Rockies, and Padres followed last year. As Dave St. Peter told the media, "This will eliminate all blackouts as we've come to know and hate them." The Twins have thus announced Twins.TV, an MLB-run streaming service for the games. The spine of this will be a direct-to-consumer subscription, which will likely follow the same pricing structure as teams sold them for last year—$20 for a month or $100 for the season. For those who already subscribe to MLB.tv and want the full in- and out-of-market experience, the price tag will be higher, but the difference from what you were already paying might be minimal. Beyond that, the team will likely partner with most major cable services—including Xfinity—for those who remain cable subscribers. As noted in the press release, the Twins should now be available to 4.4 million fans within their projected area, compared to less than a quarter of that in 2024. But that newfound reach comes with a price. A million people paid for access to Twins games as part of their monthly cable bill, whether they wanted it or not. Companies like Xfinity and DirecTV paid the network carriage fees, then passed the costs to their subscribers. Now, the Twins will face a darker question: Just how popular are they, when fans need to opt in rather than out--and when the price they're paying is suddenly much more visible to them? The Twins reportedly received around 80% of their 2023 intake of $54 million to remain with Bally Sports North for 2024, implying a take around $40 million. That will be hard to match, at least in the short term. Even St. Peter acknowledged that in his remarks Tuesday. The Padres scored around 40,000 subscribers on their direct-to-consumer service last year, which would generate revenues around $5 million. The Minnesota area is certainly bigger than San Diego, though it's also a space where the Twins have to compete against quite a few more sports for attention. Many are already cutting streaming services left and right; is $20 a month for a single team enticing enough? That's not all the money, of course, with various deals being made with the cable providers. San Diego had perhaps five different ones, though details on how much they yielded were scarce. That slice of the pie figures to be tiny. We're talking, now, about the league going to the carriers with hat in hand, needing to get their channel aired. They don't have a package of sports that can deliver year-round content, or even 24-hour supplemental content around the games, to offer. It's unlikely the carriage fees associated with this model will be even 10 percent of what Bally could command, though we're obviously doing an apples and oranges thing there. Nonetheless, there will be some money beyond the raw DTC revenues. Furthermore, MLB and the Players Association recently struck a deal to send more money to teams in this situation, though the specifics again are unclear. The Rockies might give us a better sense of what might happen to the Twins, given they are currently valued similarly by Forbes. According to research, Colorado's switch over from their broadcast deal with AT&T to MLB cost the team about $55 million in annual value. If you thus figure the Twins to lose $30-40 million in value tied in with their broadcast rights, you might also have a very good idea where they may have already balanced those books. St. Peter isn't expecting the lost cashflow to further reduce payroll, because the team reduced its payroll to match the new reality a year early. The president informed reporters he expects less money than what Ballys provided in 2024, and Joe Pohlad's recent comments had already planned for this announcement. In effect, last year's slash was about this very eventuality. The big question is whether this is too late. The Twins had this same opportunity last year. Now, they lost fans to that lower payroll, as well as an Xfinity blackout that kept them off TV for three months and a disastrous September collapse. Twins fans might have made their peace with the drop in payroll, in exchange for being able to stream games the way the team initially promised. Instead, they got the stick without the carrot for a full year, and it turned a lot of people off. The team is now in a pretty different position than are the Brewers, Diamondbacks, Guardians, or Padres, mostly because of those clubs' better on-field performances. The best way to get fans to subscribe may simply be to win games and a lot of them. On the broader side, Manfred continues to bring teams into his fold, with six teams secured and more likely to follow. The Texas Rangers also announced the end of their partnership with Bally, but have decided to explore production and distribution options that might present themselves locally, rather than lump in with the league. The Tigers and Royals, like the Guardians, are still playing postseason games, and unlike the Guardians, they have a contract with Diamond Sports Group to stay on their local flavors of Bally Sports through next year. However, it wouldn't be surprising at all if that deal were vacated, given Diamond's recent indications in court, and at that point, both Detroit and Kansas City could come inside the tent, too. Ultimately, the league would like to be able to bundle and sell streaming packages featuring all of its teams directly, but they need way more clubs to be dependent on them before that can happen. Nor does it make much sense to plunge forward with that project sans many of the biggest draws in the sports. Huge contracts paying hundreds of millions to big-market behemoths still stand in the way of that happening. In other words, until top teams like the Dodgers or Yankees run out of ways to make orders of magnitude more than the teams leaning on the league will get, the package deal is a non-starter, and solutions are likely to remain piecemeal. All of MLB will be facing a war for eyeballs, and now the Twins are going to be front and center of that battle. Those eyeballs all mean money, so winning those battles and skirmishes will be essential. The Twins' medium-term spending power depends on it. View full article

The Padres and Twins had similar offseasons, wherein ownership and broadcast issues led to huge salary reductions. So why were the Padres successful? Image courtesy of © Denis Poroy-Imagn Images During the final broadcast of the season, former MVP and current Twins TV color commentator Justin Morneau spoke about studying other teams, and seeing what they did well. It’s obvious to point to a team like the Royals and show how they added $100 million in payroll to turn it around this season. However, if the Twins are going to spend less, the question is how to spend it better. Case in point: The San Diego Padres. After losing owner Peter Seidler to cancer and finding themselves victims of the Bally Sports fiasco, baseball operations head A.J. Preller was given a mandate to aggressively cut payroll. He did so, dropping San Diego from 5th in the league in spending to 12th from last year to this one. That meant losing not just All-Star, but era-defining players: Juan Soto, Josh Hader, and Blake Snell departed, among others. They also suffered from a bizarre 2023 season in which a huge 10-game difference between their expected record based on run differential and their actual record led to their missing the postseason. Meanwhile, they watched the rival Dodgers pour over a billion dollars into their winter additions. The result for 2024? The Padres finished only five games behind the Dodgers, and easily secured the top Wild Card spot in the National League. According to FanGraphs projections, they’re actually better built for the postseason than their LA rivals, whose pitching ran thin late in the campaign. This was a team that cut $90 million in payroll to begin the season and cruised to victory all season long. So how did they do it? Overpay For Talent, and Lots of It The Padres have not been afraid to offer big contracts, even ones so ridiculous that the league office has nixed them. The Padres have three position players (Fernando Tatis Jr., Manny Machado, and Xander Bogaerts) and two pitchers (Joe Musgrove and Yu Darvish) all making more than Byron Buxton will in any of his contracted years, and all those contracts last through at least the 2027 season. And guess what? They combined for 8.7 hitting fWAR and 2.5 pitching fWAR. That’s $95 million in WAR for $90 million in salary. Part of this was prepping for injuries. Tatis and Boegarts both lost time to injuries, while the two pitchers were each limited to less than 100 innings. It didn’t matter, because that Padres still had other players like Ha-Seong Kim, Jake Cronenworth, and Wandy Peralta to fill the gaps. And if you remove Jackson Merrill (more on that later), the team only gave 1.6% of its plate appearances to rookies. Turns out, having enough players with big money means you don’t need to rely on every single one of them to deliver. Trade Early, Trade Often Preller is an executive who would move a dozen players back and forth to gain 0.2 WAR and a few years of team control, and while it might drive some crazy, it often works. Forced to move Juan Soto (who ended up earning $30 million in arbitration with the Yankees) as well as dumping Matt Carpenter, Preller somehow still found ways to make a number of other trades. Just as the season began, he convinced the White Sox to give up Dylan Cease, who threw a no-hitter for the Padres this summer. In dealing Soto, he got a fully formed starting pitcher in Michael King, as well as starting catcher Kyle Higashioka and prospects--one of whom, Drew Thorpe, then became a centerpiece of the Cease deal. Frustrated with an early offensive slump, he made a surprising May trade to get three-time batting champion Luis Arraez. And at the deadline, Preller beefed up the bullpen by dealing for two top arms, in Tanner Scott and Jason Adam. For good measure, he picked up Martín Pérez just to eat some innings down the stretch. Reports suggested they almost scored Jarren Duran from the Red Sox, too. In all, Preller dealt 12 of his team’s top 21 top prospects. That might seem like a team destined for pain down the road, but the team has had a seemingly endless supply of prospects in the past and knows that winning fixes everything. Small Deals, Big Payoffs Despite a team with three major stars, the Padres’ All-Star this year was none other than Jurickson Profar (4.3 fWAR), a former No. 1 prospect who finally paid off with a true star-caliber season after a decade-long career--while making just barely over the league minimum. Other signings overachieved, too, including former Twin Donovan Solano (0.9 fWAR), David Peralta (0.5 fWAR), knuckleball savant Matt Waldron (1.9 fWAR), and waiver pickup Jeremiah Estrada (1.6 fWAR). These were all acquisitions that cost $1 million or less. Compare that to the cheap pickups Derek Falvey tried this year, which all backfired. Whatever magic Preller has in picking lottery tickets, Falvey desperately needs his own bag of tricks. Score Big With Your Rookie Phenom There was a possibility, early in the season, that Brooks Lee (or Royce Lewis, for that matter) might have put up numbers like the following: .292/.324/.500, with 24 home runs, including three walk-off shots. Alas, that wasn’t the season for Lee or Lewis, but for Jackson Merrill. Dubbed “The Kid” by broadcaster Don Orsillo, Merrill led the team in WAR, playing 155 games all while the shortstop prospect learned to play center field on the fly. Perhaps call it luck, but Twins rookies and sophomores mostly disappointed on the season, and having that kind of power could have turned the season around. Though Merrill was one of the game's top handful of prospects even coming into the season, this item ties in with the last one, about finding diamonds in the rough. Both elements of success come down to doing great player development even at the big-league level, including coaching. This is one reason why the Twins fired four coaches this week; they haven't been getting the most out of talent the way the Padres have been. Be a Big Spender, Anyway, Especially When You’re the Only Game in Town San Diego is ranked 26th among baseball media markets. But ever since the Chargers left, they’ve leaned into being the only game in town, drawing in 3.3 million fans (4th in the league) despite the payroll cuts. The Padres still spent $169 million this year, which put them in the top half of the league, despite being a smaller market than the Twin Cities. You might look at some of these numbers and balk that they put too much in single players, but it turns out it does not matter when you have enough to go around. When Seidler died, there were details about how the man ran the team with no inhibition. According to another owner, "People [in the sport] were upset with him because he spent his own money, but he wanted to win the World Series and he wasn't worried about the cost. He did it the right way -- he paid into revenue-sharing, rather than being a recipient." And even when feeling cheaper than last year, the Padres still spend big. They might get October gold as their reward. The Twins can learn from them on many fronts, especially that one. View full article

The Twins may stay with the radio broadcast partner they have had for most of their franchise history, even though some feel a new deal might be necessary to help the team's reach grow. Image courtesy of © Matt Blewett-Imagn Images As reported by Dan Hayes on Friday night, the Twins are looking to secure a radio contract with WCCO that would likely take them into the next decade. The deal comes at a nervous, even perilous time for broadcast rights, in which the Twins will once again face a fight to secure a future for the team’s television and streaming rights. Moreover, while last season put the wind in their sails, now they face a tougher battle (including flat in-person attendance, after projections suggested a major increase) in terms of securing an audience. Radio might seem quaint in the age of in-your-pocket high-definition streaming video, but it remains surprisingly vital for sports audiences. About 80% of Americans still listen to radio each week. Plus, given the recent kerfuffle with Comcast over the summer, radio became one of the few ways Twins fans who managed to care could listen during what was a banner season--at least for those summer months. The radio deal comes at a time in which the Twins had numerous options, as Aaron Gleeman of The Athletic reported early this season. The team looked at bids from not just their partner for most of the team’s 64-year existence, but also from KFAN and SKOR North (aka ESPN 1500). Breaking with WCCO would not be unprecedented—the Twins formerly joined SKOR North from 2007 to 2012, before the Pohlad family used their own broadcast media empire to create a dedicated station under KTWN. Eventually, the Twins returned to WCCO in 2017. Nor would any change necessarily result in a change to the in-game announcer team of Kris Atteberry and Dan Gladden, as the two are employed by the team. Continuity is an option, in all aspects, but Twins leadership is also looking to grow the fanbase, and changing lanes might be the best (or only) way to do so. Joining KFAN would have given the Twins a space for dedicated sports listening, which has been pulling around double the amount of listeners WCCO gets. Given the non-Twins content on each station, a change also would have meant taking on a younger set of listeners--the kind that comes with the FM territory and the sports-centered programming, as opposed to news. However, KFAN also has deals with almost every other team in the market, including the Vikings, Wolves, Lynx, Wild, and Gophers. The station just announced a long-term extension with the Vikings, while the two basketball teams came over just last season. All that shared real estate would probably mean only a fraction of the games in a given season airing on KFAN itself, while others would be forced onto secondary stations like KFAN+ (96.7) and possibly even further down the line. That kind of back and forth (“switch to this station for this day and that station for the next”) might not be preferable for most fans and is never preferable for the team trying to help them find the product, even if there are many listeners using digital apps. (To solve for this, KFAN’s parent company iHeart Radio made a dedicated streaming platform just for Wolves and Lynx games with much more content, and they would likely do the same for the Twins.) Furthermore, KFAN’s coverage has been much more critical of the Twins on their main talk shows than has the sports coverage on WCCO. Moving to a new home, then, might mean not just playing stepchild while joining a bigger family, but being picked on and poked by a new family of choice. Within the organization, parties differ on the relative value of getting positive, safe coverage and a warm (if dim) spotlight--the package on offer from their familiar partners at WCCO--and of widening that spotlight and reaching for more fans, even if it comes with second-class citizenship. SKOR North would be the most experimental option; the station has a minimal market share, but has pushed hard toward streaming and YouTube. That pursuit of new consumers in fledgling spaces (at least for this type of content) might allow the Hubbard-owned station to stand out in their own way. It would also likely mean more productions outside of Twins coverage. On the business side, iHeart has been stronger in recent years than WCCO corporate owners Audacy, which has spent years trying to recover from bankruptcy. While iHeart has also seen profits drop as it grows its podcast business, it is recovering alongside the ad market. If reports are correct, the Twins will stay with the familiar and safe side and stick with WCCO. Whether or not it's the best choice will be for fans' ears to decide. Would you prefer to see a new radio partner for the Twins or to remain with WCCO? Sound off in the comments. View full article

After a win Wednesday night, the Twins are still stuck in the doldrums, far from playoff glory and needing friendly winds to get there. But two brewing storms (one real, one spiritual) might raise their spirits. Image courtesy of © Brett Davis-Imagn Images We all know the situation is dire. The Twins’ chances to make the playoffs are down to a sliver. They started today at 22.9%, and that's already come down substantially. Yet, despite the Tigers and Royals finishing off sweeps of the Rays and Nationals, respectively, things are not over yet. A lot must go right for the Twins, though as colleague Matthew Taylor wrote this week, a Baltimore team with nothing to play for will provide a nice little boost. But the Twins need to take a mile when given an inch, and two more little advantages might swing it all in their favor. Here’s the Story of a Hurricane While three AL Central teams battle out for Wild Card spots, the NL Wild Card race has remained extremely tight as well, between the Diamondbacks, Mets, and Braves. The big showcase series of the week was a showdown between the two NL East powerhouses. But after Atlanta took the first game, the impending floods of Hurricane Helene shut down yesterday’s and today’s matchups. Despite desires by MLB to simply move the games to a neutral site, the vanity of owners—who of course moved their stadium outside of the downtown area and made it entirely inaccessible by public transportation for “reasons”—could not imagine lost ticket sales for a pair of games. (Tuesday’s matchup drew over 40,000 people.) To make it up, MLB has created what can only be called a makeshift “Game 163” day, with the Mets and Braves playing a doubleheader on Monday to decide a trip to the postseason. And if the rains persist on Friday, the Braves might have to do a doubleheader with the Royals on Saturday, as well. That means the Braves now begin their series with Kansas City Friday, seeing a chance to play first against a weaker team that has looked shaky in recent weeks, rather than a team whose vibes are the stuff memes are made of. The Diamondbacks and Mets will spend their weekend against two tough opponents, in the Padres and Brewers, respectively. Both those teams clinched their seeding earlier this week, but are still unlikely to show much mercy. That gives a Braves team that looks quite different from the powerhouse that began the season a chance to prove their worth. It also means that the two starters lined up for the Mets series, Cy Young leader Chris Sale and the very good Max Fried, are in play for this weekend, rather than some of Atlanta’s younger and more inexperienced arms. Braves manager Brian Snitker has said his plan is to watch the status of the other games games and make decisions as needed, with Fried getting the start Friday and waiting on what to do with Sale. But being able to toss them against the Royals (not to mention potentially using reliever-turned-starter Reynaldo López as he returns from a brief IL stint) might give the Royals more trouble than they want. “I'm not dead!...I’m actually getting better!” The Chicago White Sox have been one of the funniest, saddest and most revealing franchises of modern baseball (you likely only need one guess who is responsible for this one), now tied for the record with the 1962 Mets for the most games lost. And yet, the team is slightly surging in this most dire hour. Chicago’s South Side experiment in lousiness has perhaps decided to show a little life, going 5-5 in their last 10, including their first ever come-from-behind win against the Angels and an extra-innings bloop from Andrew Benintendi to win last night’s affair. Then they jumped out to a 7-0 lead on Anaheim again Thursday. Now the White Sox line up against Detroit with their best starter, in Garrett Crochet, as well as rookie Sean Burke. Burke will be making his fourth start, and over three previous ones (against Cleveland, Oakland, and San Diego, all of which have some impressive offensive power) has only allowed 3 runs over 14 innings. As others have noted, the White Sox can avoid not just the mantle of most losses, but just one win will give them the chance to avoid the worst winning percentage of all time (that belonging to Connie Mack’s 1916 Philadelphia Athletics). Will the White Sox show up in Detroit with something to prove? If they do, they might give the Twins the shoulder they need. Who is to say if the Twins can pull this out? These slight advantages, though, give us all a reason to watch and hope, rather than lament. View full article

I think this is fair but it's more fair to say "we have no idea what Zebby's numbers the third time through the order actually are." I agree, probably leave him in, partially because worst case you get a home run that ties, and then maybe you get one of your better (or even so-so but not Cole Irvin) arms against the righties and pray your hitters do anything.

The Twins will face another major financial challenge with on-field implications this offseason, as they become free agents looking for a service to broadcast and stream their games. But will they actually deliver on the promises they broke last offseason? Image courtesy of © Reid Glenn / USA TODAY NETWORK Last week, Twins fans tuning into their game against the Rays experienced something quite strange. Technical issues plagued the broadcast, causing it to remain fixed on the center-field camera view. The valiant technician zoomed in and out for hitter and pitcher reactions between the pitches, though he had no way to actually follow any ball hit into play. Some might call it an avant-garde performance: Others will call it part of a long line of injustices, in the worst experience for Twins fans wanting to watch the game this season in recent memory. To recap: After promising “the end of blackouts” via new broadcaster Cory Provus early last offseason, the Twins re-upped with Bally Sports Network, despite its continued bankruptcy issues being settled in a Texas court. Games were, instead, only available to cable subscribers in the regional area. Aggravatingly, though that choice was about maximizing revenue, no meaningful reinvestment of that money into payroll took place. The choice came to a head in May, when Diamond began its fight with Comcast over carrier fees, leaving around 80% of Minnesotans essentially without baseball months into what should have been seen as Year Two of a new dynasty. The flare-up has been seen as part of the critical loss in revenue for the Twins, who have failed to build their audience, dropping from 19th to 23rd in average attendance with only a handful of home games to play. Minnesota has fallen behind resurgent teams like Baltimore and Arizona, who took their successful 2023 rosters and infused them with new talent. As September rolls along, the Twins now have two weeks left on the Bally Sports Network, and it’s about time to begin asking where things stand. As Dave St. Peter recently told Front Office Sports, they “remain undecided” and continue “reviewing and exploring different options.” But where exactly might fans watch the team next year? While the Twins are free agents once again, they will have 29 other owners looking over their shoulder. As a mid-market team dependent on broadcast revenue—a recent filing suggested that the average MLB team gets 25% of its earnings from broadcast rights—they will be looking to Rob Manfred to assist in ensuring a big deal going forward. As St. Peter remarked, that needs to include some sort of streaming option. “Digital rights have become a gating issue for us, meaning we have to have those on some level.” That should be good news for Twins fans, as another year without streaming would be an unqualified failure. But what Manfred can do to help secure a package similar to previous cable deals remains the big question. Much of that depends on Diamond Sports Holdings (DSH), the Sinclair subsidiary that has been the center of the chaos with their continued bankruptcy procedures. The story has been twisting throughout the year. To recap, DSH received a large influx of cash in January from Sinclair and Amazon—who remain very interested in expanding Prime’s sports offerings beyond Thursday Night Football—that likely meant a deal that would include streaming of five MLB teams. Approval of the plan was delayed throughout the summer, all while the Comcast carrier fees fight soured things further between the three main leagues and DSH. Other carriers like Cox and DirecTV (which just concluded their own carrier fee dispute with Disney) found that MLB stonewalled these cable carriers from their deals with DHS. While the NBA and NHL have a deal in principle to cement a future with Bally, Manfred and his team (who must approve any part of Diamond’s restructuring, as creditors) petitioned to see the other league deals, which the judge denied. From the atmosphere, Manfred seems wary to give approval, preferring to rip off the Regional Sports Network Band-Aid. It seems like a no-brainer for the league, which would then be able to take over half of the league into a package for a major streaming service going into 2025--though none of the teams in question would be major media market teams like the Dodgers, Yankees, or Cubs. In a recent court filing, MLB has argued that the bankruptcy needs a swift resolution, with major teams unable to plan for free agency (not that these teams are planning for the Soto Sweepstakes). St. Peter himself has said the Twins want to have something in place much earlier in the offseason than last year’s disaster. Such a future being ensured will be critical to any choices (though almost certainly limited) the Twins front office might make during the offseason. Even if Bally finds a way out of court, will it find a way to survive the streaming era? Amazon pulled out of their current cash infusion arrangement, but recently re-joined as a partner to move forward with streaming Bally RSNs on Prime. Others suggest that Manfred has entered discussions with ESPN, perhaps to develop a package for either ESPN+ or Disney’s proposed Venu joint venture with Warner Bros-Discovery and Fox Broadcast (itself now facing an antitrust lawsuit). Either deal—if it included the end of backouts across the Minnesota territory—would be the right one for St. Peter and crew. But streaming is simply not worth the value of old-fashioned cable rights, and if the Twins are only receiving half of what they once received in broadcast money, many might wonder how the team will proceed—or who might be on it. The MLB and MLBPA recently agreed to move some money to teams struggling with this transition, but whether that goes to players or owners' pockets will be a testy issue. But what else can the Twins do? Both the Wild and Timberwolves will remain with Bally, as long as the bankruptcy is approved and the company stays afloat. For as much as the team has made its own mistakes along the way, they are also fighting with their hands behind their back. They could go their own way, of course--an idea I proposed last offseason to embrace local TV and forgo revenue to rebuild the fanbase. (St. Peter responded to the idea with very little interest.) Or else, Twins fans could simply hope to watch more Virtual Game Experiences, as they had the option to the other night--an experience that I would prefer never to see again: Where would you prefer to watch the Twins next year? Sound off in the comments. View full article

That wouldn't explain his numbers in later innings. He often faces those players again and does great.

The Twins starter has had the most reliable track record of any of the arms Minnesota has used all season. So why can’t he simply start the game with a clean first inning? Image courtesy of © Bruce Kluckhohn-USA TODAY Sports Bailey Ober turned in another stellar start on Sunday afternoon against the Toronto Blue Jays. Bouncing back from a rough outing against the Atlanta Braves, Ober struck out eight over six innings. The afternoon became Ober’s 11th quality start (six innings with three earned runs or fewer) in twelve outings, putting him in a very good place to lead the Twins through the rest of the season with a lock on the second playoff spot. Ober also once again demonstrated his Achilles heel, allowing a home run to Ernie Clement in the first. The 6-foot-9 righty has one of the more unique problems in baseball: flopping in first innings. Ober spots a 7.27 ERA in the first inning. While a lot of that has to do with his disastrous Kansas City start to begin the season and his recent Atlanta Braves mishap, removing those games still leaves him a 5.09 ERA, with a shockingly high 5.48 FIP. That includes 10 extra-base hits (including six dingers) and eight walks, even removing the catastrophic outings. Comparatively, the 2nd through 5th innings are gems for Ober: a 2.48 ERA and a 2.83 FIP. The strikeout-to-walk ratio is even more telling: Ober sports a 2.3 K/BB ratio to begin the game, but then it doubles to 5.2 from the 2nd inning onward. Of all MLB starters, Ober ranks sixth-worst when comparing his xWOBA in the 1st inning against what he puts up during 2nd through 5th inning. (Ironically, Cy Young candidate Chris Sale ranks worse than Ober, but only because he has been so dominant otherwise). It is a notable difference among the Twins’ four main starters this season: Player 1st Inning BA 2nd-5th Inning BA 1st Inning xWOBA 2nd-5th Inning xWOBA Bailey Ober .281 .212 .364 .279 Pablo López .240 .257 .291 .301 Simeon Woods Richardson .169 .249 .269 .325 Joe Ryan .247 .208 .255 .274 So why does Ober perform so poorly to start the game, only to bounce back seemingly every time? Smart baseball people will tell you that innings are irrelevant: what matters is how many times through the order, with most pitchers fairing quite poorly the third time through. And while Ober’s stats certainly improve the second time through, they are nowhere near as distinctive as those first-inning stats: his xWOBA drops from .281 to .235, while opponents' batting average increases from .192 to .200. So what does Ober do differently when it comes to his first inning? He's not the first pitcher to suffer from the problem. Some pitchers have had an even worse case. But in the aggregate, bad first innings often lead to bad outings. Not so for Ober. My first theory was his pitch type; Ober throws too much of his fastball, or cutter, or what-have-you. But as Ober has suffered bad first innings, he has switched up his approach multiple times, only to see the plans go awry. Ober uses his three main pitches—the fastball, cutter, and changeup—about the same amount in the first three innings, with slight variations, though hardly enough to make any meaningful argument. The next argument would be about the zone. Does Ober change up where he is landing pitches? We can see his pitches staying relatively in the same place when it comes to righties on the outside: But you see more and more movement when it comes to lefties and the inside part of the plate: This chart finally put me onto what might be happening. If you look at xWOBA, left-handed hitters have been lighting up Ober on inside pitches, for a difference of .258 for righties but .391 for lefties. And the lefties in the first inning absolutely have his spot: In the 2nd through 5th innings, righties marginally improve to .298, but lefties drop precipitously, to .225. Ober seemingly cannot figure out lefties until after the first inning. Nine of the 12 extra-base hits by Ober opponents have come from lefties (who have a first-inning SLG of .659, vs. .256 for righties). And notably, all of them are in pitcher-friendly counts: six with two strikes, and two on the first pitch (the only one on 3-2 count was also the only one on a misplaced changeup, to José Ramírez). These are some of the best players in the game—Shohei Ohtani, Corey Seager, Bryce Harper—but Ober clearly has struggled all season with this situation. Teams have been very aware of Ober’s early lefty problem, which explains why the problem manifests in the first inning rather than the entire first time through the order. He’s faced 57 lefties in the first inning, but only 44 lefties in the second, and often that means the top players in baseball. Meanwhile, he’s faced 55 righties in the first, compared to 51 in the second inning. So can Ober figure it out? Ironically, his start against the Blue Jays might have showed a path forward. Clement got the home run, but the other three hitters that inning were lefties. None of them would see a pitch on the inside portion of the plate. In fact, the only pitch anywhere near the inside was this harmless pop out by Nathan Lukes: Lukes Pop up.mp4 Moreover, Matt Olson’s home run was Ober’s first hit allowed in the first against a lefty since Jul. 22. Perhaps this is all relatively unimportant, since Ober remains not just this team’s co-ace, but one of the league’s best pitchers. If Sale can win a Cy Young with the same problem, why not Ober? In part, it's the potential. It's taken Sale almost a decade for him to put together a season like the one he is having now. And if Ober wants to enter that echelon early (or more importantly, not give every Twins fan a nervous breakdown in October), solving this problem now is necessary. If Ober can manage to end his first-inning woes, he might legitimately reach the ace level we hope for. View full article

Switch-hitter Willi Castro won an All-Star spot in the first half by smashing both lefties and righties. Now, he suddenly can't buy a hit against a southpaw. Image courtesy of © Jesse Johnson-USA TODAY Sports On Monday night against the Royals, Willi Castro had another signature moment in his impressive, burgeoning career. Down by a run, Castro launched a homer off right-hander Brady Singer, giving the Twins a two-run lead and pushing the team on toward an 8-3 win. In Wednesday’s loss, Castro fared less well, with two strikeouts and an extremely soft line out to lefty Cole Ragans. An 0-for-3 day against one of the best starters in the game (plus a popout against reliever Lucas Erceg) would usually be nothing to worry about. However, the bad day fits into an alarming trend for Castro since the end of June. He became an All-Star, in part, due to his switch-hitting prowess--especially his ability to punish left-handed pitching. But since the start of July, he has become an automatic out for southpaws. The numbers should be ringing alarms within the Twins front office. Castro dropped from a stellar 202 WRC+ against left-handed pitching in the first half to a mind-bogglingly low -49 WRC+. He is 2-for-38, with only two walks and 10 strikeouts. I cannot emphasize this enough: From the beginning of the season through June, Castro was the best hitter against left-handed pitching on the team. Now, he sits dead last. Lefty pitching usually means small sample sizes, but it is quite impossible to look at these numbers and not see someone who has lost themselves at the plate. Month BA Against RHP xBA Against RHP BA Against LHP xBA Against LHP Mar/Apr .197 .225 .345 .259 May .250 .266 .417 .276 June .274 .255 .360 .291 July .250 .221 .080 .208 August .355 .341 .000 .107 Castro’s usefulness to the Twins remains substantial. He fills multiple shoes throughout the defense, and plays practically every day. Crucially, during this disastrous period, he still holds a more-than-healthy 120 wRC+ against right-handed pitching. But if the team’s health improves, it will be hard to imagine a role for him with a lefty on the mound; he could be relegated to platoon duty. What is behind this brutal drop? Simply put, lefty pitchers are finding out where to put fastballs against him. Castro has yet to hit a single fastball by a left-handed pitcher for a hit, and you can see here that they’ve finally found his weak spot from the right side of the plate, where Castro is letting balls go by and putting himself in weak counts. That often means he forces himself into swinging at anything coming by, in the hope of finding contact. Although it looks much more red all over in his early months, what the data is showing is how Castro had no particular spot that he would hold back. Now it’s clear what to do as a southpaw: start on the outside part of the plate and get him quickly into pitcher-friendly counts. This remains a fascinating wrinkle in Castro’s game. After all, the reason Castro has been a recipient of a staggering number of Hit-By-Pitches is because of right-handed pitchers trying to play him inside. But comparatively, left-handed pitchers are working him away, where he gets overeager. His whiff rate against lefties is just a hair under 50%, meaning half the time he swings, he just flat-out misses the ball. Left-handed pitchers are simply putting the ball on the outside edge, where he cannot seem to find it. Castro's best spots are more inside the plate; he finds himself reaching out for balls on the outside and making weak contact. One theory was floated by broadcaster Cory Provus during a game this week. Provus reminded viewers that Castro originally had a poor start to the season, but as he moved around to each position, he quickly found his swing. Since the beginning of July, Castro has almost entirely been relegated to the infield (despite the needs in the outfield), and since Brooks Lee’s injury, he's remained at shortstop. It would be hard to believe this kind of change in defensive responsibilities could make a difference, especially when Castro remains an essential hitter against right-handed pitching, but perhaps the repetitive motion of throwing strongly with his right side across his body over to first base is adding a strain. Or, perhaps more conspiratorially, Castro is nursing an injury unbeknownst to the clubhouse that has affected his right side. Let's assume, for a moment, that he's healthy. That certainly doesn't preclude the rest of Provus's theory. One very difficult thing about being a switch-hitter is that one must maintain two different swings, which can be exhausting and extra difficult. Paradoxically, though, you're two different hitters, but you're still only one person. A change from nomadic defensive responsibilities to playing the same place every day means changing one's mindset to half of one's job, and it's plausible that that would lead a switch-hitter into some trouble with the highly plastic task of maintaining two distinct offensive approaches. Hurt or healthy, what is notable is how controlled Castro's recent swings are--but not always in a good way. When batting as a lefty, Castro can look a bit all over the place, leaning in and out from the plate and losing his balance in the process. But look at this pitch against Cubs reliever Drew Smyly on an 0-2 count, in an area where Castro once punished the ball: Smyly Out.mp4 The swing seems almost casual, and the lack of power is quite obvious. Look at how his hands seem to drop immediately after making contact. It is, simply put, not a Big Swing. Look at a recent left-handed swing where Castro finds a hanging cutter and see the difference: castro double.mp4 You can see the power on display. The whole body leans into the swing. Something different is happening when Castro swings from the right. Castro’s days as a starter against southpaws feel numbered, if things do not turn around. While Rocco Baldelli has kept him hitting first against right-handed pitching, he found himself in the six-hole against Ragans Wednesday. If Correa returns soon, I might imagine him dropping down even below catchers Ryan Jeffers and Christian Vázquez. Nobody wants to see it, but moves might become necessary faster than expected. What do you think is behind Castro’s plummeting numbers? Sound off in the comments. View full article

After multiple shortened, hampered campaigns, the Twins have managed to keep a healthy Byron Buxton on the lineup card and stationed in center field, while still having him smashing at the plate. Image courtesy of © Brian Bradshaw Sevald-USA TODAY Sports When Byron Buxton signed his extension in the late winter of 2021, there was one central question on most Twins’ fans mind: even with a team-friendly deal, would Buxton play enough to make it worth it? Both the 2019 and 2020 campaigns ended with injuries. When a fastball to the hand limited his 2021 season, he came back too late to make a difference in the losing season. The next year reminded us all how great he can be when he's on the field, but ended without him, while 2023 demonstrated the pitfalls of protecting his playing time. This campaign has been entirely different, however. Buxton has been a consistent center fielder, whose bat has only gotten hotter every month. He's slashing .276/.335/.517 on the season. Since May 1, the only outfielders who have accumulated more WAR are Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, and Jarren Duran. Any long-term worries an early slump prompted have dissipated. More importantly, he has done it not by spending most days as a DH, but in the field, where fans have come to love him. For once, Buxton seems to have survived a collision with the wall unharmed. He's only a fistful of games from matching his 2019 innings total in the outfield, a number he hasn't reached in any of the intervening years. Let’s just say this guy has been out of work. The Twins’ approach in 2024 has been defined clearly: rather than protect Buxton to keep him all season, they have let him loose, without special constraints. But a few notable differences have kept Buxton healthy, and might make for his star-turning moment in October. Forget the DH In 2023, the Twins organization decided it was their job to protect Buxton from injuries, but their plan backfired. The team watched him struggle as the designated hitter, a skill that has made a number of players frustrated in recent years. In an in-depth article by Hannah Keyser, a number of regular DHs—including Andrew McCutchen, Bryce Harper, and Giancarlo Stanton—discussed the difficulty of finding a groove when not spending their time on their toes. Early in the season, Buxton was still seeing a mixture of scheduled off days, center field time, and DH duty. He started as the DH four times in April, and had six off days that month, leading up to his stint on the injured list in early May. Their initial strategy continued to be the same disaster as last year, resulting in a .211/.211/.263 line. He has not done a day at DH since May 22. Buxton still gets more days off than other teammates, but this change in policy has worked for the best. Buxton had the third-best month of his career in July, and he's blasted five homers and three doubles in his last 12 games. Good, Not Great Defense Notably, Buxton’s defensive metrics are down. He's been worth 3 Defensive Runs Saved, but that reflects a pace toward only 5 or 6 in a full season, which would be the worst such mark for him since his rookie campaign of 2016. Meanwhile, SABR’s Defensive Index, which is used to determine Gold Glove winners, has given Buxton a negative rating so far. Defensive metrics (not to mention Gold Glove finalists) are notoriously difficult to evaluate, and sometimes have resulted in questionable winners. Plus, all the metrics still put him above his stopgaps, like Willi Castro and Austin Martin. Buxton has certainly made fewer superstar catches than he had in previous years (though there have been a few stellar moments, like the daring play he made Sunday). And as much as I have watched, I cannot recall many moments where I felt he had taken his foot off the gas. Perhaps Buxton only goes 80% to 90% while out in the field, rather than 110%. Only he could say. But if there are no moments where one could point to his defense as a problem, one must admit this plan is working. Speed Over Steals Earlier in the season, Buxton suggested he and Willi Castro would fight it out for 30 stolen bases. Neither has come close, with Buxton only nabbing six bases so far (while being caught twice). That’s even less than last year, when he managed 15 steals over the disappointing half-season. That follows out of a year where—Elly De La Cruz excepted—stealing has continued its upward tick, with new rules making steals easier. So what happened to that early confidence? While steals are certainly aesthetically pleasing, they are also not worth that much in value. Buxton has instead used his speed with the ball in play—by speeding across bases, turning singles into doubles or bringing a run across when others put the ball in play. Buxton has always had elite sprint speed, but his 29.6 feet per second this season is his fastest since 2021. Stealing is an art, but baserunning aggressiveness can often create runs in a way steals cannot. Perhaps there is an injury Buxton is trying to avoid by stealing—it would be worth asking him why his early season prediction went south. (The team is set to have a similar number of steals to last year, but Castro has significantly decreased his stolen base attempts, as well.) But if the Twins are getting all the beauty of Buxton’s hustle along the bases without having to resort to steals, then all the better for it. All for October The Byron Buxton Resurgence can end at any moment. Twins fans know it too well. A misplaced ball could end it all. Or perhaps a lumbering sausage. Sunday was the latest close call. But the Twins have found an adjustment that works, giving us the Buxton we all want. Now, we just need to hope it lasts. View full article

The Minnesota Twins are on pace to break a painful record in 2024: most times hit by a pitch at bat. Here's a look behind how players like Willi Castro and Ryan Jeffers are taking lead on a not-so-pleasant stat. Image courtesy of © Matt Kartozian-USA TODAY Sports Willi Castro had a chance to break the game open against the Pittsburgh Pirates. It was the top of the 10th inning. Although the Twins had brought a run across the plate, the automatic runner in extra innings meant no guarantee of a win. Castro fell behind early with two strikes, but then got a lucky break. Except in his mind, it wasn’t so lucky: The Twins have been the recipients of 57 plunkings over the first half of the season—one ahead of their rivals, the Cleveland Guardians. That’s on pace for over 114 hit by pitches (HBPs), eight more than the record set by Buck Showalter’s Mets in 2022. And if Matt Wallner rejoins the squad, given his penchant for hit by pitches, they will almost certainly set an unexpected record. Plunk me once, shame on you. Plunk me twice, shame on me? It certainly seems like more than dumb luck that the Twins have become targets for those on the mound (and on top of that, very good luck that Carlos Correa narrowly missed a few broken bones in the rubber game against the Diamondbacks). But there are some surprising decisions by the batters that have resulted in the not-so-lucky chase for bruised glory. Hit by pitches have generally increased in recent years. What was once limited to a revenge decision (and as we saw Kody Funderburk plunk Blaze Alexander, occasionally still is) has become quite common in recent years. While I cannot say for certain, I do not believe any of the HBPs this season have been thrown with malice. Instead, it's just the new norm. With pitchers throwing more gas on off speed pitches and three true outcomes pushing for more pitches in general, teams seemed to have accepted there is little difference between a walk and an HBP. And in the same way that “he gets on base” might have become the first turn toward baseball analytics, teams are willing to let players take the base. Teams have certainly begun strategizing for “plate crowding.” During the 2021 Astros-Braves World Series, the not-so-great catcher Martín Maldonado came up to bat with the bases loaded in Game 5. Maldonado specifically chose to crowd the plate and took a plunk from A.J. Minter’s wild cutter. “Did you guys notice how close he was to the plate on the at-bat against Minter?” A future Twins shortstop told The Athletic at the time. “That was sick.” Perhaps Correa brought that energy to the Twins, though in the words of Jean Renoir, everyone has their reasons. There is one curious stat that helps us understand exactly why these HBPs might be landing on Twins’ arms more than others. Baseball Savant provides a stat called Plate X, an advanced metric that measures the horizontal distance of the ball when crossing the plate from its direct center. Obviously, the Plate X for all HBPs is going to be further out than 0. But when you break out each player, most of them are below the MLB average. These are not balls traveling that far outside the zone. # of Ht By Pitches Plate X (Closer to 0, Closer to Plate) MLB Average - Righties -1.94 Margot 3 -1.66 Correa 2 -1.68 Jeffers 11 -1.77 Castro (RHB) 1 -1.81 Farmer 6 -1.83 Buxton 7 -2.21 Miranda 3 -2.18 MLB Average - Lefties 1.99 Castro (LHB) 10 1.76 Wallner 4 1.52 Kepler 3 1.76 Santana (LHB) 3 2.01 Two hitters in particular are leading the way: Ryan Jeffers and Willi Castro. Both have been hit 11 times. There are obvious reasons why pitchers pound them low and inside. They swing and miss most often when locating there, and when they do it, it’s most likely to be a ground ball: Jeffers is a curious case. When asked about the bruises, Jeffers simply described himself as turning into an armadillo, unable to really move out of the way. But looking at his actual plate appearances, there is a curious problem he faces: Jeffers is a toe tapper when he swings: Many players throughout baseball end up tapping their foot before grounding, but what makes Jeffers a curious case is he does it so late in his swing. Here are three images from games where Jeffers is right about to be hit—the ball is halfway to the plate and Jeffers has not yet begun to move. He’s too busy setting his timing with the darn toe: No wonder why he has little time to get out of the way. Castro is a different case. At 6’1” and just a bit over 200 lbs, he is a rather slight player. He has also admitted he likes to crowd the plate. But more than anything, he really, really loves to swing across the whole plate. This would not be a problem if Castro was Aaron Judge. But because he is a little guy with a below-average swing length, he often throws his whole body into it. If you look at his home runs, he will often end up with a foot right in the middle of the zone because of the amount of spin on his body. Here are three home run machines and Castro at the end of their home runs, and you can see where the body lands: Castro uses his body so much that, well, he can end up on his ass, which we saw against the Diamondbacks: Castro Falls Down.mp4 So what does that have to do with HBPs? Castro loves hunting for that nicely placed ball on the outside of the zone, so he is certainly standing closer to the plate. This is not someone thinking about getting hit. Instead, he is simply fishing to ensure those meatballs end up as dingers. The common thread here is balance, and the ability it provides to get out of the way when the ball comes at you. Jeffers gets his front foot down very late, which leaves him almost no time in which to make a move, because you can't bail out effectively with that foot in the air. Castro has the foot down sooner, but is transferring his weight and a whole lot of kinetic energy down through that leg just as the ball is reaching him. He's even more locked into his spot in the box than Jeffers, just with the other leg. You'll often see some hitters raise their hands, go casually up on tip-toes, and let a ball sail by, within a few inches of their pants or shirtfront. Neither Jeffers nor Castro really has that move in their bag of tricks. Other Twins are creeping up in HBPs: Byron Buxton has now reached seven, a curious case given how much he deliberately chooses to not crowd the plate, while Kyle Farmer has six (notably in low playing time) and Santana sits at four. (Wallner, in his brief time at the beginning of the season, also amassed four.) But no one is doing it like Jeffers and Castro. After becoming the Bomba Squad in 2019, I doubt the Twins hoped to become the Bruise Squad. But, recent offensive production suggests whatever the team is doing at the plate is working. So, let us salute the beans! Let those smacks lead to runs scored. Just watch out for those dear little bones. View full article

Better swing discipline in the zone has put the Twins' infielder into the everyday lineup. With the minors likely behind him, he's coming into his own. Image courtesy of © Bruce Kluckhohn-USA TODAY Sports If you tried to rattle off a list of hot Twins players right now, you’d probably mention José Miranda in the second tier of solid hitters for this team. But what is interesting about Miranda’s renaissance is how little has changed from his disastrous 2023 season, when a bad start sent him back to the minors before a shoulder injury ended his season. In 2024, Miranda still lacks true power in his swing. He draws very few walks. And his strikeout rate has shown only marginal improvement. Instead, Miranda is simply hitting more in the zone. When players fix their approach at the plate, it usually has a lot to do with finding their sweet spots. When Carlos Correa struggled at first in 2022, he snapped out of it when he finally stopped chasing difficult pitches outside the zone. Miranda still swings at the same number of pitches outside the zone, though he has improved how often he hits them by about 5%. Instead, Miranda has found more contact within the zone. In fact, Miranda has an in-zone contact rate of 90.5%, which puts him in the top 50 within the league for players with over 150 plate appearances and is the highest for any Twins player (except Max Kepler, who just caught up). But the case becomes more complicated when we look at his heat maps. Miranda is focusing entirely on his sweet spots. Rather than simply swing if a ball is in the zone, Miranda now focuses on mostly hitting in the top of the zone: Because he’s been a foul machine, Miranda is the best Twins hitter with two strikes, hitting .244/.261/.384. The closest regular is Carlos Santana, who is only hitting .214. Miranda has only let seven called third strikes go by. How does Miranda take advantage of fouls? Let’s take a look at this at-bat in Houston against Ronel Blanco. The result here is a walk, but Miranda fouls off seven pitches to get there. Blanco starts off with two pitches pretty far outside the zone, so Miranda let both of them sail by. That puts him into swing mode. He then gets a pitch just above the zone and right in his sweet spot, so he smacks it foul. Pitch 3.mp4 Blanco puts the next outside the zone, but quite close to Miranda’s sweet spot. He chases and makes contact, making it 2-2. Every pitch here, now, could put him away, so Blanco goes to the slider up in the zone, and Miranda takes a swing at it, throwing it into the stands. Pitch 5.mp4 He then tries a fastball in the same position, hoping that the batter won’t catch up. Miranda makes contact anyways. Pitch 6.mp4 He then tries the change up down in the zone. This time Miranda tries for his low angle swing but ends up topping the ball into the ground. Pitch 7.mp4 Blanco tosses another slider away that Miranda refuses to chase, so he tries another changeup, just a little inside. But Miranda still catches most of it and throws it away foul. Pitch 8.mp4 Finally Blanco will throw it away, and Miranda will take his base. Five of the pitches he saw were two-strike offerings in the zone. And Miranda refused to let a single one of them go by. While Miranda has improved, one wonders if this approach will last. Miranda has the highest “called strike” rate of his career, at 16.4%. And as pitchers adjust to his more controlled approach, they will certainly work on pinpointing those spots he prefers to avoid. It’s also affecting his power. Miranda is generally hitting harder and has a stronger barrel rate, but a significantly lower Hard Hit rate. That could mean that when pitchers find the right spot, they force him into more dribblers, rather than line drives. His swing doesn't seem able to sustain its speed down in the zone, the way it does when he gets the ball up at the belt or above. More adjustments loom. That's always the case. But for now, Miranda has got his shot. And he certainly got his bat speed up on a pitch down in the zone Thursday afternoon. What do you think about Miranda’s changed approach at the plate? Or do you think pitchers will take advantage? View full article