Jham

I remember reading your report last year and was pumped to see Meyers like right then. However, he struggled mightily with consistency, often when it seemed he was a start away from a call-up. His success and command seem to swing wildly from one start to the next. I guess based on what you scouted, Meyer could be an ace. But other scouts that have seen his bad days project him as a bull pen arm (potentially elite, btw). If he does have a 4 pitch arsenal, he needs to work on 2 things, unfortunately in AAA: mixing in more breaking balls. 2) adding and especially subtracting on the fastball to gain command. I think Verlander is the best at throwing at 90-95% so that he can add a few mph late in counts and late in games. I remember the first time I heard of JO Berios was when he was a spring training invite as a teen-ager and had TK and others gasping at a big breaking ball. Scouting reports said he was still developing that pitch but had a mid-90s fastball. Stellar work ethic. Height didn't hold back Pedro or Big Time Timmy Jim Lincecum. Sold. Stewart is a mile away, and I'm not sure I haven't been more intrigued with Gonsalves all along... Berrios, Meyer, Stewart.

Interesting piece from http://rotoscouting.com/alex-meyer-scouting-report-2014/ Don't know a ton about the scout, but at least he'd watched him at two points in his career. He projects him as a potentially elite level closer. Nothing wrong with that, btw.

I wonder if we are putting to much pressure on this kid to be the next staff ace. Maybe we should just let him develop instead. I'm not sure we're doing him many favors by comparing him to all-time greats like Randy Johnson. Aside from being left-handed, Johnson was one of the most durable pitchers of his generation. He generated easy speed. His herky jerky mechanics hid an incredibly smooth 3/4ths delivery making his velocity even more deceptive. His release point was basically directly at a left-hander's head. I've never seen Meyer throw, but I'm not sure I've read that he has any of those qualities. Not too many starting pitchers can get by on fastball, slider. I'd start him out in the pen, and hope for Papplebon upside. Otherwise he'll probably need to develop a plus change-up or cutter. Major league hitters don't swing at garbage, and can time up any amount of heat by their 2nd trip through, if not within their first at bat. Given his durability issues, it seems bringing him out of the pen is a no-brainer, at least at first. I'm trying to think of a fair comparison for Meyer as a right-handed starter with a 2.5 pitch assortment, and I really have a hard time coming up with one...

That's my point. The past 4 years have not provided open competitions. Guys were handed spots they hadn't earned (Hicks, Pelfrey, Guerrier). If Pelfrey is somehow the best pitcher and wins the spot, he could make the team better both present and future. I'm sure he'd be a positive influence on any young pitchers that got called up. He could actually prove to be a tradeable commodity or allow us to move another pitcher for more talent. We can argue about whether a player would develop faster due to pressure to improve and competition or facing major league hitters, but I think its the latter mentality that ultimately depleted the organizations talent to begin with.

This.

Are the lines even set by human beings? I picture a bunch of servers in a back room crunching numbers and crushing on metrics we don't even know about to set lines all while plotting a Matrix style world take-over. My main concerns are 1) Hughes regressing which seems almost 100%, 2) Glen Perkins loss of velocity and break on his slider and hints at arm fatigue toward the end; 3) Joe Mauer's decline continuing (the thread on this topic had some troubling data in that regard); 4) Nolasco just might not be very good in the AL; and 5) Meyer/ Buxton/ Sano being capable major leaguers but not star caliber. To me, those issues concern me more than the potential of the prospects, adding Santana/Hunter, and hoping for bounce backs from Mauer and Ricky. I hope I'm wrong. Line seems about right...

Man, the season hasn't even started, spring training hasn't even started for that matter, and we're already talking developing players? How about the best player plays. If we're 20 games back at the All Star break again, then let's give some younger guys a shot. But I do not think we do anyone any favors by simply handing guys jobs based on "potential" which sometimes means we haven't seen them fail yet. Actually, Milone is a great example of this. Pretty much this whole forum loved the trade acquiring Milone last summer and praised TR for landing a big fish on light tackle, even though it left us with a pretty messed up Center Field situation. Milone represented "potential" in that we hadn't seen him fail yet. Maybe he'll fail again, and May or Meyer will step up. But giving guys jobs that haven't earned them is a bad idea. It fosters a losing attitude. It tells the team that the front office doesn't care if it wins or doesn't think they can win. It tells players that hard work, effort, and skill matter less than age, so why bother trying? And it tells prospects, eg Aaron Hicks that they don't have to be better than the next guy in line to play which both sets them up for failure and stunts development and work ethic. Basically, giving the 5th spot to May or Meyer just because their perceived ceilings are higher than other options makes just as little sense as giving the 5th spot to Pelfrey or Milone just because we are paying them more. Let's break camp with the mentality that we can compete and win. Necessarily this means we need competitors and winners. Let's see a fierce competition for the 5th spot, and may the best pitcher win. Which I suspect is either Milone or May, btw.

Actually, I'd take ANY of his road ERA/FIPs for the Twins 5th starter this season. I'm sold. Milone's job to lose.

There is something to be said for known commodities. I know these tend to be very prospect heavy threads because we invest so much enthusiasm into watching young players develop. It is tough to look at favorable box scores and metrics for years and years and not get excited about actually seeing them play for the first time. It's a lot like the most popular person in town being the backup quarterback. If you don't like the product in front of you, it's easy to clamor for what you haven't seen fail, even though the alternative is usually worse. If Hunter is as bad as his detractors are saying, then e.g. Rosario should have no problem ousting him. But I remember when the Twins turned down guys like Coco Crisp and Melky Cabrera because they weren't as sexy as a blue-chipper like Elsbury or Cano. It only cost us Lester or Phil Hughes (sort of) and possibly Ian Kennedy in his prime and maybe even Bucholtz. Known commodities often have more value than you realize. To those worried about Hunter getting frustrated if we lose 90 games. We seem to have an entire team of players that don't care, and don't get upset over mountains of losses. Not everyone in the clubhouse cares about winning. For those of you who say Torii is all for himself, no one consistently risked their health and career for the team and for wins more than Torii. I for one, would be very disappointed if he did not get angry in the midst of another wasted season. If it wasn't for Torii, who knows, maybe we never make the push back to relevance in 2001. Maybe we get contracted and there is no Twinsdaily. If it were not for Torii Hunter, there would be a lot fewer passionate Twins fans out there. He deserves respect, if only for what he's done for baseball in Minnesota.

There are 5 Cy Young award winners on that list. Comparing Alex Meyer to that list because of similar BB/9 seems a little narrow. I would guess more separates Meyer from those others than just the Twins management. Like others have said, it probably isn't the walk totals that have held him back so much as the arm problems and occasional seriously labored outing (which seemed to always come when there was talk of a promotion). We kicked and screamed for Gibson, May, Albers, and Slama while the scouts told us they weren't major league ready or simply weren't major leaguers. We are all anxious to see what we have in Meyer, but let's make sure we get the best Meyer possible.

I mean, I don't want to blame it all on the curse of the center field pines... but you can't spell spell "spruce" without "curse". No metric for black magic.

I think it's all about bat speed, which usually goes when players get older, and why you often see rapid declines in productivity. It is exacerbated for Joe because he lets the ball get in so deep. Once bat speed drops, you have to do one of 3 things to compensate: 1) guess; 2) start earlier; 3) switch to a lighter bat/ choke up. Most players do a combo of 1 and 2 which is likely why changing speeds was so effective against Joe. Poor pitch recognition is more often than not, poor bat speed which causes guessing or starting/committing too soon. (Think Nishioka). Thus, the players that look like they have a problem with breaking balls, actually have trouble catching up to fastballs. (Think Delmon Young). For the first time I can really remember, Joe looked totally fooled on many off-speed pitches, and simply couldn't catch up to heat. That's a decline in bat speed. My advice, swing a lighter stick. You're not a power hitter anyway.

Great analysis. Re: HS pitchers, it was speculated by some that it was not "risk" that kept us from drafting high upside 18-year-old arms, but rather an unwillingness to pay the large contracts associated with them. It would be interesting to see the draft efficiency ranking and actual WAR ranking framed against their "draft day expenditures" to see if we were indeed getting more bang for our buck.

To me, it's baffling how a team that has been so terrible over the last few years can even fathom putting Hicks or Schaeffer on the field over a hitter like Escobar. Plan D, PLEASE. Face the facts. Hicks has had his shots and fell on his face. We have Buxton arriving next year at the latest, and better (and younger) options in the corners for the following years. Even if Hicks comes out of nowhere and is better than he's shown at any point in his major or minor league career, he holds down CF for what, maybe a year? Ditto Santana. Santana was by most accounts raw defensively at SS. Is he a stop gap to Polanco or Gordon? Couldn't Escobar fill that role just as well? As a perennial 90 loss team, shouldn't we be putting our best lineup out as often as possible rather than crossing our fingers that Hicks or Schaeffer will develop into a stop gap at best?

I think Pelfrey would and should accept an assignment to AAA. He's seemed loyal and apologetic to the organization for standing by him while he hurt the team by playing. I believe if he opted for free agency and signed somewhere else (fat chance) he'd forfeit his contract with the Twins (fatter chance), no? Then if he some how comes back to his pre-elbow and nerve surgery form (fattest chance) he can provide depth or bull pen help or hopefully a low level prospect or cash sometime next season. I'm super sick of waiting for pumpkins to turn into stage coaches. I know we all love prospects because everyone on this site is invested in them or we wouldn't be posting here. But no prospect should be given a spot in order to "see what we have". If your strategy for improving your team is to ignore your scouts and just throw under-achieving blue chippers out there with fingers crossed and hoping against hope they will be better big leaguers than minor leaguers, well then we're back to pumpkins, stagecoaches, and more 90 loss seasons. As in it baffles me that anyone could claim that a prospect is "blocked" on a 90 loss team. If the best players don't play, where is the motivation to compete? Milone is most likely the best 5th starter. If May isn't better than Milone, we need to trade May, not Milone or Nolasco before the clock strikes midnight and all of baseball knows our stagecoach prospect is actually a big orange pumpkin.

I didn't even know we had Jose Abreu. As the reigning AL ROY, I would think we'd want to add him to the 40 man roster.

Everyone criticized the Royals and lauded the Rays at the beginning of the season. The Rays were one of the worst teams in baseball, the Royals one of the best. You'd have thought the criticism and adulation would be reversed. Sometimes we over think things. Baseball does not have the same salary cap restrictions that other sports have. Success is achieved by a continuously accumulating talent. Different teams have done this in different ways. The Yankees had a great run of accumulating talent based on buying veteran talent (ditto Detroit). The A's have put together a good run through money ball and smart trades and acquisitions. The Redsox combined those approaches and won a couple championships. The Twins have utterly failed by taking the conservative route of jealously guarding prospects AND refusing to bid on safer or smarter free agent options. Top of the rotation guys like Price, Lester, Shields, etc will always be tradeable. Guys like Nolasco and Pelfrey, not so much. Bottom line, there are a lot of different ways to do it, but you have to consistently add to your net talent. Consistently losing 90+ games and waiting for the high draft picks to pan out has to be the worst.

Gardy, thanks for bringing us out of the darkest years of Minnesota baseball and making us a model franchise for a decade. You guided us out of contraction and introduced a new generation of baseball fans to postseason ball. Your success paved the way to a new stadium and higher payrolls (which haven't panned out), but you set the groundwork for continued rebirth and success for.... hopefully... Doug Mientkiewicz. You never figured out the Yankees, but you were always a steady presence. Best of luck. Let the Doug Mientkiewicz era begin!!

Pitchers also pitch differently when the shift is on, which the stats don't show. This may effect the outcomes as well. Where a pitcher may typically choose to attack David Ortiz with breaking balls away, the same pitcher may elect to run fastballs inside with a shift behind him. A tactic which encourages a pitcher to pipe fastballs into a power-hitter pull-wheelhouse is a gamble to say the least. For instance, I was at a Cleveland series this year where we were shifting on Carlos Santana. He dropped down a bunt single in game 1, a seeming win over the shift. However, the Twins also thought they won by turning Cleveland's clean up hitter into a bunter. In game 2, we continued the shift and Santana turned on one and crushed it over flag pole. There's no shift for that! It would be nice to see a stat comparing singles against the shift vs. extra base hits and HR in order to determine its overall effectiveness.

I agree. I am not a statistician, but I do love to read the analysis of the proponents of the various metrics on this site. Always enlightening. The point of metrics is to limit the variables. One could never, and would never want to completely eliminate the variables which would by definition create an entirely predictable result. Who would want to watch a game if you knew what the outcome would be? For what its worth, I have never seen anyone on the site proclaim that BABIP is a metric that measures luck. Instead, it has been described as a tool to help predict bounce back and regression, and determine if luck is a factor or if another variable (defense, pitch selection, ball park etc.) is in play.

No one has mentioned his absolutely perfectly placed drag bunt last week. That was my favorite DanSan moment. I got so frustrated watching Hicks hit under .200 and refuse to drop down a bunt and use his wheels. Parmalee had the entire infield playing first base last week and refused to drop down a bunt (same series Carlos Santana dropped down a bunt for a walk-to-first base hit, then went yard in his next at bat to emphasize how you beat a shift). On a team that has to play small ball to win, and with a bunch of players struggling to bat over .215, we can't afford to leave hits on the field or fail to execute on a sacrifice.

I wonder if this is institutional since Cuddy and Morneau had the same problem. Players have this problem when they can't catch up to major league heat and have to cheat (step in the bucket or open up early). But it can also be a way to try to force the ball to the opposite field by keeping everything closed at the sacrifice of base and power. This certainly sounds like something the Twins would teach. Think about how many times you hear Twins officials talk about staying back rather than hitting off a stiff front leg. It's the difference between driving the ball to right and pushing it. Mauer and Colabello inside out pitches the other way and thus can still hit with a stiff front leg and generate power.

Oh, did Deduno not lead the team in quality starts last year? Who pitched into the 7th or 8th inning more than him? I forgot, the rest of the staff, throw in the new guys even, were consistently going 7 strong every time last year right? Deduno was better in the first and still better in the 7th than the other trash pitchers we have. Pelfry had one of the worst full seasons I've seen. He was rewarded with money and a spot in the rotation based on the hope that he'd improve. Deduno worked his butt off, improved on everything the Twins asked him to improve at, had the best season of anyone on the staff, comes in and pitches well in spring training after rehabbing his shoulder, and the Twins demote him to the pen based off the assumption that Pelfrey and Gibson will be better than their horrible showings last year and that Deduno will regress. The disturbing message this sends a young ball club is that doing what the club asks and working hard doesn't matter, and that management can't be trusted. Antony just called out players for not "stepping up". Why step up if the club is just going to play favorites anyway?

A couple things. We all love the latest greatest metrics or we wouldn't waste our time on these blogs. That said, i would hope everyone here still enjoys watching the players play more than checking the box scores and entering data for anova regression analysis. Deduno was our best pitcher last year statistically, metrically, and to the eye test. Sustainability is a question mark. But his performance last year has earned him the right to back it up. I sure hope the team is bringing him out of the pen because of his shoulder and not because they want to keep him there. He'll be a better as a starter where he can relax and play with tempo and pace without overthrowing the ball. And let's face it, we probably don't want him coming in cold with the bases loaded and having to throw strikes. If Diamond or Worley start, he will almost certainly be asked to enter the game in this exact situation by either the 2nd inning for Vanimal or the 4th inning for Diamond.