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Steve Lein

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Everything posted by Steve Lein

  1. Steve Lein
    I wouldn't put him above Stewart or Meyer yet either. Especially based solely on his age in comparison, which is what I think is being done here. But you can't deny what he did last year, at least in the FSL - he absolutely dominated it. But he was quite ordinary after being promoted if you ask me. If he makes the same adjustment to AA early this season as he did going into the FSL though, it'd be very hard to argue. And I also think it's a mistake to doubt him at this point. Just a bit premature on moving him ahead of Meyer (based on stuff) and Stewart (based on potential) for me.
  2. Steve Lein
    Nice catch. My line of thinking still applies!
  3. Steve Lein
    I think Stewart pitched better at Cedar Rapids than Berrios did the year before, all while primarily shelving his best strikeout pitch. I think that's going a bit unnoticed. He also didn't have much of Win-Loss record because of the pitch limit that made it hard for him to get through 5 innings. I'm very excited to see what he can do in the FSL if they loosen the reigns a bit.
  4. Steve Lein
    They had him on a limit of 85 pitches or 6 innings. There were starts in there that he dominated, but was pulled after 6 innings at 85 pitches or so. From a Judd Zulgad article after Futures Game last year: "The Twins, rightfully so, have been extremely cautious with Meyer this season. He missed two months last year because of shoulder soreness and the Twins have been very strict with how many pitches the 24-year-old is allowed to throw per outing. "It's been six innings or 85 pitches, whatever comes first," he said. "Last time our pitching coordinator was in town so I got to go a little bit longer, but I think (the decision to be careful) comes with the shoulder injury from last year."
  5. Steve Lein
    I agree with you here. It's not just you who thinks it. The Twins are constantly referred to as one of the most conservative teams in bumping prospects, often times the most conservative. With Meyer, I think their overall plan was to make sure he could stay healthy for a season without the pressure of contributing in the majors. I don't agree with several parts of that premise, but there are some talking points. One of which I'm sure the Twins would point out, is that before last year Meyer's highest innings total as a pro was 129 in his first year (2012). He pitched 130 last year, and has had those injuries in between. That's not a very high peak total for a SP prospect in the minors. Trevor May has pitched 150+ innings essentially 4 times. Kyle Gibson pitched 150+ his first year. Jose Berrios pitched 140 last year. While the Twins purposefully limited Meyer in 2014, it may well have had a direct relation to his health. This is the only argument with Meyer that holds any merit to me in relation to why he hasn't been called up, though I still wouldn't use it as the reason not to. He without a doubt has the best "stuff" of any pitcher in the Twins organization, is 25 years old, and has shown he can dominate the AAA level. He can't 'learn' to stay healthy. It's time to bring him up so he can continue to develop into that top-of-the rotation MLB starter they think he can be, as I don't think there's anything left he needs to or can learn at AAA that he can't in the majors. That said, I'm fine if he starts off there because he didn't 'win a battle in ST,' but that better mean he's on a very short list (of one) for the first call up if anything else hasn't gone wrong.
  6. Steve Lein
    I'm of this thinking as well, but wouldn't quite put him past Glen Perkins just yet. Though I do think that is inevitable.
  7. Steve Lein
    Examples of players who could hide command issues in low-levels is as old as the minor leagues. Well, the modern minor leagues (Rookie leagues through AAA). Shooter Hunt is a perfect example of one for the Twins. Billy Bullock is another. If I spent time looking I'd probably find at least 20 others for the Twins... In just the past 10 years... If you're at all into reading sites like Baseball Prospectus, Baseball America, etc... which focus on the minor leagues, you will have read at some point a statement along the lines of: "[so and so] has a ceiling of a [whatever], but could also end up a AA-command flameout." It is very much a thing.
  8. Steve Lein
    I think there are tons of easy common sense ways they can speed up pace of play, but I'm not even sure it's the pace of the game that needs to be adjusted, but also the pace of how they broadcast it... For pace of the actual game, why does a relief pitcher need to throw 10+ warm-up pitches from the mound? Why does a hitter have to step out of the box after every pitch? Those are just a few examples, each of which would shave off 10-20 minutes of time on their own. The bigger problem I think, however, is the pace of the TV broadcast caused by the associated advertiser $$$. Everything is sponsored now: Pitching changes, the seventh inning stretch, the scouting reports they show on air... All these things have a "sponsor" that gets pitched. I'd love to see someone track how much time is spent on plugging a product during a baseball broadcast these days. And I'm not even talking about commercial breaks, I'm talking about the things during the game broadcast. "This call to the bullpen is brought to you by [fill in the blank]," etc... I think those seconds would add up pretty quick to significant amounts of time. There's so much extra stuff than the actual game being played, that I think this is what turns off the ADD crowd, or just the casual fans they're trying to cater to.
  9. Steve Lein
    Saw him throw an inning in Cedar Rapids (along with a start from Lewis Thorpe) that I wrote about here. He does have some form of a changeup, and it is inconsistent. But in that article I have video of a 3-pitch strikeout he had. The last pitch to the guy was one of the dirtiest changeup's I've ever seen. It dropped off the table and froze the hitter in almost comedic fashion to catch the outside corner for a looking K. He may not need it, but it's a great extra weapon to have.
  10. Steve Lein
    I thought it was Keith Law I saw a blurb from, but I haven't been able to track it down again. But there was something I read that said that it ended up being less than originally feared, and he should be ready to go. Of course we won't know on that for sure until it happens, but I was pleasantly surprised to read that. Just wish I could find it again.
  11. Steve Lein
    1 million times this. High strikeout pitchers can get away with a lot of walks. He was also 7th among all qualified pitchers in the International League in ERA. That tells me the walks weren't a major issue.
  12. Steve Lein
    Yup, I love those metrics too. I'd use them in this argument as well though (the batting #2 vs batting #3). What "RC" does fundamentally to me, is combine two different abilities of a hitter: His ability to put himself in a position to end up scoring a run himself (essentially OBP), and ability to bring in runners available to him (essentially SLG). In this way, Mauer's number is driven largely by his ability to put himself in a position to score (high BA/OBP), which is worth more in the RC calculation than the ability to bring in runners (high SLG), as it should be. He's very very good at this (one of the way's he is great), one of the best in the game over his career, so his number in this is very good. Dunn's number is driven by his power, but it's limited because he's not good at putting himself in position to score in other ways (low BA/OBP). That's why you see the difference in those numbers and what I'm showing. Not at all arguing Dunn was worth more to his team than Mauer (that's something that's not debateable either), just that he produced more direct offense to scoreboards for his team.
  13. Steve Lein
    There literally is a 2.5% percent difference in the "random" amount of opportunities each had in those numbers above. That is nothing in this context. All these numbers say is over the course of that season, Dunn was more successful at producing runs for his team than Mauer. And it is factually undeniable. To Seth: Sorry! I wasn't even paying attention to the article topic. And this is just stuff I find interesting in relation to Mauer. Not bashing. I always get accused of that! I already said Mauer is "great" in several ways before this.
  14. Steve Lein
    I know it's flawed for such reasons, but is the most blunt force way possible of looking at it. A full season is a pretty good sample size, and the bigger the sampling size you take, the more such conditions normalize and deviations become negligible between two sets.
  15. Steve Lein
    Right. What I'm saying is you want that guy to be more aggressive in these situations. I don't think Mauer is.
  16. Steve Lein
    This is the calculation I made: Plate Appearances: Mauer - 641 Dunn - 649 Plate Appearances with no runners on (variable "A"): Mauer - 325 Dunn - 360 Plate Appearances with one runner on base (variable "B"): Mauer - 225 Dunn - 208 Plate Appearances with two runners on base (Variable "C"): Mauer - 84 Dunn - 72 Plate Appearances with bases loaded (Variable "D"): Mauer - 7 Dunn - 9 Runs Batted In (Variable "R"): Mauer - 85 Dunn - 96 Percentage of Total Possible Runs Produced = R / [A + (B*2) + (C*3) + (D*4)]: Mauer - 85/1055 = 8.0% Dunn - 96/1028 = 9.3%
  17. Steve Lein
    I understand and get the point of the first paragraph, but I want my best hitter doing whatever he can to bring runs in, instead of passing it along to the next guy. Runs are what win games, not putting another duck on the pond. And I'm gonna blow up the second paragraph because I've done research on this topic, just never have published it. Was more geared to make the argument Mauer should bat 2nd instead of 3rd, but works here too. For that research, the season was 2012 that I looked at. I took the primary #3 hitter from every team in baseball to compare against Mauer. Mauer has an excellent batting line with RISP over his career, however, that hasn't translated to even what I'd call average run production. Reason being? He doesn't hit a ton of XBH's in those situations, and draws a lot of walks. Lots of singles not scoring a guy from 2nd, lack of doubles to score a speedy runner from 1st, etc... He was very high in categories like batting average (tied for 4th) and on-base percentage (2nd), but much lower in things like HR's (28th of 30), RBI's (15th of 30), and slugging (24th of 30). His OPS of .861 was barely above the average of .851 for these players. One calculation I did was a percentage of possible runs these players produced. Based on RBI's and how many possible runners could have scored depending on the what the player did in that at bat. This calculation included the possibilty of a HR. I can't find that full spreadsheet for all 30 players, but my memory is telling me he was dead last in this calculation. I was able to find another sheet though, comparing him against Adam Dunn for this calculation that year. I don't know how to demonstrate this idea any better: Adam Dunn and his .204 overall batting average on the season produced a higher percentage of possible runs while up to bat (9.3% vs 8.0%) than Mauer did while batting .319. I'll repeat, Adam Dunn was a better overall run producer by batting .204 than Mauer was by batting .319.
  18. Steve Lein
    This is one of my exact criticisms of Mauer. For as good of a hitter as he is, he has always been way too passive in RBI producing situations. He treats it the same as any other at-bat, and primarily works the count to get on-base if he can. He takes too many walks just like Votto. This is also a reason where I'm not necessarily in the camp that always defends Mauer's abilities as an 'elite' player. His skill set relies a lot on the other players in the lineup to make him truly stand out (outside of his MVP season). In this way I tend to argue with the people who call others idiots for pointing out his flaws. Mauer is definitely a great player, but it's a different kind of great than they are trying to defend, in my opinion.
  19. Steve Lein
    I don't think he was throwing harder in HS, but scouts saw all kinds of projection. I seem to remember 87-90 MPH range back then. Believe he's bumped that up a few ticks to be in the 90's, with the potential to continue to grow into the mid-90's.
  20. Steve Lein
    This is one of my issues. And don't get me wrong, Joe has a great approach that definitely has served him well until recently when his K numbers have climbed. The problem I have with that, is that he uses the same approach for every single at-bat. Doesn't matter the situation or the pitcher he is facing. It's almost literally the exact same thing, every time. That's exactly the type of thing pitchers can adapt to, and in some ways have, such as with the first pitch down broadway stuff. If they know that 95% of the time Joe isn't going to swing at it (5% is exactly his career rate for putting first pitches in play), that's a pretty safe bet to get ahead of him 0-1, and quite possibly a direct correlation to that increase in K's. Also with the first pitch strike stuff, it comes up that this almost all of the time, is going to be the best pitch he's going to see in the entire at-bat. It's criminal to me to ignore that, especially if it's a situation where there's guys on base to drive in. I'm all for this if he want's to feel out the pitcher in say his first at-bat. But in subsequent at-bats, he shouldn't have to, but still uses this same approach. It's also interesting to me that when Joe does swing at that first pitch, his batting average is the highest of any ball/strike count over his career. I think that putting the ball in play number needs to climb higher than 5% on first pitches the way pitchers are treating him now, and he would benefit greatly from it. All that said, if Joe does bounce back, it's a non-issue. But that's why these questions come up.
  21. Steve Lein
    Yeah, Hamels is a guy your going to have to put together an offer full of top 10 prospects to even get anywhere in talks. Buxton or Sano would get those conversatios going in a serious direction, then it's going to take a Meyer or Stewart and someone in the top 7-10 range, and probably something else to get it done. You take Buxton or Sano out of the conversation, then it becomes a Meyer or Stewart, and May, and Polanco type, and something else. Either of those are too rich for my blood.
  22. Steve Lein
    Yeah, definitely lacks a position, but think that bat is top 5-ish in the system.
  23. Steve Lein
    Wonder how far up this list Minier will go after mashing in E-town this year... I'd have him higher, but hard to argue since he's just getting started stateside.
  24. Steve Lein
    Well, I wouldn't go that far, he was certainly praised for his athleticsim. Keith Law, for example, rated him as the #10 prospect in baseball before the 2011 season (http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insider/columns/story?page=LawTop100Prospects1-25): His profile: "Hicks took a step forward in 2010 by converting his tools into baseball performance. He's a true five-tool player, with an 80 arm in the outfield, above-average speed, future plus power and excellent bat speed. He's much smoother hitting right-handed, with better balance and weight transfer, and it showed this year in his platoon split, as he hit just .248/.383/.339 against right-handers even though he was repeating the level. His plate discipline continues to improve, and there's plenty of leverage in there for power when he fills out, but the inability to hit right-handed pitching is a major concern that will have to be addressed, perhaps by having him give up switch-hitting if it doesn't improve. On tools alone, Hicks is a top-5 prospect in the game, and I still expect him to become a star, but there's some risk here and I can understand why the Twins are taking it a little slow with him." Sounds pretty similar to me, but you are right there is a difference. Also going back the the Hunter mentor thing, this article is up on mlb.com today: http://m.twins.mlb.com/news/article/107814252/torii-hunter-to-mentor-minnesota-twins-young-outfielders
  25. Steve Lein
    Also, on the "leave Arcia in RF, put Torii in LF" argument. I don't think it's about their lack of faith in Arcia improving in RF, but more on what they think each brings to the table in the OF To me, you can classify OF defenders in two categories, fundamentally: 1. Those with good instincts who can put there head down and run to a spot. And, 2. Those who have to constantly track the ball with their eyes. Based on Torii's gold glove CF defense in his early career, I'd say he's in category #1, even though he's lost that range with age. Also with that CF defense, comes the experience of moving in both directions to track down fly balls. There's no doubt that Arcia is in category #2, and isn't that great with his limited speed and instincts to begin with. Now, drawing from personal experience, as a right-handed player (glove on my left hand), even though I played both corner OF spots in my playing days, I always preferred being in left field because I was category #2, and it was easier for me to track balls moving to my glove side, toward the gap where most balls are hit. Maybe that's what they see happening with Arcia, that he'll do better because he'll be chasing more balls in that direction than he would in RF, while Hunter shouldn't have any issues with that, no matter which corner he plays. As a sidenote to this thought as well, Hicks often times got questioned for his effort running down fly balls because it seemed like he would 'jog' after them. Well, if he's in category #2 above (which I think he is more than #1), I can also say that when you do this, the natural thing your body/mind does is equalize your route and speed, so that your glove gets to the ball is going at the exact point you will catch it. Granted, you don't want to do this all the time, such as when you need to set up to make a throw, but I never thought it was from a lack of effort from Hicks.
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