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Josh Rahman

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Blog Entries posted by Josh Rahman

  1. Josh Rahman
    Well, it sure has been a while hasn't it? 2024 into 25 has been super hectic for me planning a move and the like but spring training starting finally got me the motivation to get writing again. But that's enough about me, you're here to read about Trevor Larnach, not some bozo living in a cheap apartment in Uptown.
    So by now we all know Trevor Larnach's story, first round pick with tons of talent but had lingering injury issues holding him back, as is normal for 90% of the top prospects in the Twins system over the years. Now in the majors and turning 28 in two days (Happy early birthday Larchad!) and with elite talent below him in the minors, he's at a career crossroads and I believe this is the year he really puts it all together. So why am I gassing him up to such a huge degree? Well it comes down to three major things you can see in his hitting profile.
    Statcast Batting Statistics
      Season Age Pitches Batted
    Balls Barrels Barrel % Barrel/PA Exit
    Velocity Max EV Launch
    Angle LA Sweet-
    Spot % XBA XSLG WOBA XWOBA XWOBACON HardHit% K% BB% 2021 24 1211 158 15 9.5 5.0 90.0 116.0 13.1 34.8 .212 .376 .300 .306 .411 41.1 34.6 10.3 2022 25 724 105 12 11.4 6.7 90.1 112.4 13.1 36.2 .227 .442 .309 .322 .437 43.8 31.7 10.0 2023 26 915 113 15 13.3 7.1 90.1 112.0 17.5 41.6 .215 .431 .313 .323 .443 49.6 34.0 12.7 2024 27 1576 268 27 10.1 6.8 92.0 113.2 12.4 36.2 .259 .458 .336 .345 .405 45.1 22.3 10.0 Player   4426 644 69 10.7 6.3 90.9 116.0 13.6 36.8 .233 .428 .317 .326 .419 44.7 29.5 10.6 MLB       82372 7.0 4.8 88.5 122.4 12.3 33.2 .245 .405 .316 .315 .368 36.5 22.2 8.4  
    First off, Larnach hits the absolute **** out of the ball. looking at his batted ball data (shown above) you can see his average exit velocity in 2024 was 92 MPH compared to the league average of 88.5, which was good for top 10% of the league(!!!!), this along with an impressive max exit velo of 113.2 shows off the insane power Larnach has in his bat, but if you need an example here's a video of him hitting a no-doubt nuke into the Delta Sky 360 Club, something only 7 Twins hitters have accomplished (including Twins legends like Jake Cave, Tyler Austin and Byung-Ho Park): 
    Twins - 1398716900658630662.mp4   Next up, Larnach has massively improved his strikeout and whiff rates. Referring back to the table (yeah I know I'm leaning on Statcast data to a pretty sad degree, but it is by far the best source imo) we can see Larnach brought his K rate down from a pretty sketchy 34% in 2023 to an almost exactly league average 22.3%. It's not elite or anything, but that mixed with his well above average walk rate combines for a player with the tools to be selective with his pitches and punish the ones he gets with the wrath of god.
    Batted Ball Profile
      Season GB % FB % LD % PU % Pull % Straight % Oppo % Weak % Topped % Under % Flare/Burner % Solid % Barrel % Barrel/PA 2021 45.6 24.7 25.9 3.8 39.9 33.5 26.6 4.4 32.9 23.4 23.4 6.3 9.5 5.0 2022 41.9 36.2 18.1 3.8 38.1 36.2 25.7 1.9 32.4 23.8 20.0 10.5 11.4 6.7 2023 34.5 38.1 23.0 4.4 38.9 42.5 18.6 4.4 20.4 28.3 21.2 12.4 13.3 7.1 2024 44.0 26.9 25.4 3.7 42.5 33.6 23.9 1.9 30.2 25.0 23.9 8.6 10.1 6.8 Player 42.4 29.8 23.9 3.9 40.5 35.6 23.9 3.0 29.5 25.0 22.7 9.0 10.7 6.3 MLB 44.4 23.8 24.7 7.1 37.2 37.5 25.2 3.9 32.6 24.8 24.4 5.9 7.0 4.8  
    Now let's hop to the batted ball profile. So, to put it simply as my caveman brain loves to, what you want in a player with pop like Larnach does is two things, putting the ball into the air and pulling it, and shockingly Larnach does both well above league average. Looking at his spray chart from last year you can pretty clearly see it, literally all of his Home Runs are pulled at least a little bit

    Now, as someone who has some ooga booga brain from time to time (I blame the brain damage from concussions back in High School Football), I have definitely fell into the eye test trap crying about how Larnach always hits the ball 5 million MPH into the ground for outs but this just isn't true. His GB rate is literally league average, I suppose it's bias seeing the ball smoked all the time leading you to think it happens more often than it does.
    So with all this in mind we just need to touch the final but also most important thing, that he's gonna finally be a full-time starter on opening day! 2024 was a solid year that bought him a starting role that will finally give him the chance to put destiny in his own hands.
    To conclude this rambling mess of stats and word vomit, Larnach has the tools to be a solidly above average corner OF.  I'm buying all the stock possible in him and even if you're jaded now I hope this might've fooled you into having some hope for our in-house players again. I leave you with perhaps the single greatest HR of Larnach's career, I honestly think this absolute monster could not be matched by even the likes of Aaron Judge or Shohei Ohtani, heck even Babe Ruth or Barry Bonds aren't hitting this kind of peak performance

    Twins - 1660284314574106625.mp4    
     
  2. Josh Rahman
    By now I'd imagine all of you know who David Festa is, top pitching prospect last year who got called up mid-season to fill the void Chris Paddack left after having yet another season ending injury. His results were middling and some of his underlying metrics don't impress but I'm here to convince you to buy in on a breakout next year (hence the article's name) so let's get right into it! Starting off, Festa's whopping 31.7% chase rate, 28.2% whiff rate and 27.8 K% all are well above league average bordering on elite, now why is he getting this crazy kind of chase and whiff rates? Well dear viewer, it all comes down to the pitch mix and Festa's certainly is set to impress. Festa relies on a 3 pitch mix, Fastball-Slider-Changeup in order from most to least used, a deceivingly simple set of offerings that when you dive into it there's a lot to love.
    Year Pitch Type # # RHB # LHB % MPH PA AB H 1B 2B 3B HR SO BBE BA XBA SLG XSLG WOBA XWOBA EV LA Spin Ext. Whiff% PutAway% 2024 Four Seamer 442 242 200 40.2 94.7 93 79 24 13 7 0 4 23 56 .304 .274 .544 .505 .410 .384 91.3 18 2349 7.0 18.9 21.3 2024 Slider 349 244 105 31.8 86.1 97 92 19 13 3 2 1 26 66 .207 .243 .315 .399 .246 .294 90.2 13 2564 6.8 29.1 20.2 2024 Changeup 308 116 192 28.0 88.4 87 80 19 10 4 1 4 28 53 .238 .211 .463 .332 .319 .263 85.9 13 1839 6.8 39.4 23.0 Displayed above is the pitch tracking data for Festa's 2024 season (praise be to Baseball Savant), if you look at pitch velocity or induced break (image attached) Festa's offerings look pretty average, but look to the Changeup and Slider's whiff rate. 39.4% and 29.1% is absolutely nuts and while the Changeup was hit hard on the very rare occasion someone put their bat to it those two pitches have been amazing at generating swing and miss leading to the really impressive strikeout numbers. The Fastball grades out well with above average ride but has been hit pretty hard and has by far been his least effective pitch so far, Festa's biggest issue though throughout his career has always been the control leading to too many walks and ballooning pitch counts, but I'm happy to report that this issue has gradually been decreasing across his time in the Twins organization to the point he was about league average in walks during his time with the Twins this season
    Year Lg IP WHIP H9 HR9 BB9 SO9 SO/W 2021 Rk,A 8.1 0.840 3.2 0.0 4.3 13.0 3.00 2022 A+,A 103.2 1.090 6.9 0.5 3.0 9.4 3.18 2023 AA,AAA 92.1 1.386 8.4 0.9 4.1 11.6 2.83 2024 AAA 60.1 1.359 8.4 1.3 3.9 13.3 3.42 2024 AL 64.1 1.321 8.7 1.3 3.2 10.8 3.35 Now looking Festa's rate stats since he was drafted we see that his BB/9 and WHIP have gradually decreased (with a low spike in his breakout 2022) while strikeouts have been steadily climbing, all this is a recipe for success and as long as he can continue to reign in the control of his pitches more and continue to generate the swing and miss he has year after year.
    Season GB % FB % LD % PU % Pull % Straight % Oppo % Weak % Topped % Under % Flare/Burner % Solid % Barrel % Barrel/PA 2024 36.6 25.1 29.7 8.6 40.0 37.1 22.9 4.0 28.0 25.1 26.9 7.4 8.6 5.4 MLB 44.4 23.8 24.7 7.1 37.2 37.5 25.2 3.9 32.6 24.8 24.4 5.9 7.0 4.8 Now it would be unfair of me to not talk about the issues with the long ball Festa has had to contend with in 2024. As you can see in the table above Festa is most definitely a fly ball pitcher (as are many of the Twins rotation) and that means when he gets hit hard, it can do big damage. Festa gave up more solid contact and barrels than average and that's definitely been a problem with his HR/9 jumping from .9 in 2023 to 1.3 through 2024 (across both MLB and AAA). However with the ability to miss bats and generate chases as much as Festa has this problem can be minimized, especially with an even small jump in control to help prevent his Fastball from being either really hittable or too far out of the zone.
     
    All in all while Festa has shown some signs for concern there's so many of the building blocks of a top end starter there that I'm 100% on the hype train, and I hope I was able to convince you to have a bit of hope that the mythical Falvey pitching pipeline is finally bearing the fruit we all dreamed of back in 2016

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