KGB

He only had 4 HR's in 2014 and 10 in 2015. If his average is dropping because he trying to hit for more power, I think we can call it a complete failure.

But I don't see a rapid decline as far as his strike outs. He been trending down for awhile. If it wasn't for the high BABIP (especially in 2013), the trending down would be more obvious. The one stat that had a big change was his swing strike percentage in 2013 (prior to the concussion). He was right around 4% every year, then a 50% drop to 6% in 2013. And it's remained at the level for the last 2 years.

Or it could show aging, better defensive placement etc. He was at his career average BABIP in 2014 and hit .277. Without power, it would be had to hit over .300 and strike out % 16-18%, unless his luck is a lot better than his career average like in 2012 & 2013. With his swing, it's hard to understand why he has been striking out so much. Since it began prior to the concussion, it probably not due to an injury. Maybe a change in his approach at the plate would make a difference.

I'd have to question whether the decline is actually concussion related or just a player getting older and just not being the same hitter. Here's his strike out percentage: 2008 7.9% 2009 10.4% 2010 9.1% 2011 11.4% 2012 13.7% 2013 17.5% 2014 18.5% 2015 16.8% His increase in strike outs appear to be the real reason for the decline. In 2012 & 2013, he got help from a higher than normal BABIP (2012: .364, 2013: .383 compared to career average of .344). If his BABIP was closer to his career average, he would have batted below .300 in 2013. Also if his strike out rate was around his pre-2011 average of 10%, he would have batted .315 in 2014 & .293 in 2015. Since his numbers went down in 2015, we would have to assume his concussion problems are not getting worse not better or it's just following the pattern of a player's production continuing to decrease as he get's older.

I think throwing out things like CTE is kind of like the Ebola scare - we are jumping way ahead. Correct me if I'm wrong, but no baseball player has ever been diagnosed with CTE. I'm not sure how to understand if he was suffering vision problems, it took him over 2 years to consider sunglasses. I think the most interesting thing he said was: "If you’re just a little off, you’re fouling off pitches you should be driving into the gap,” he said. “In the big leagues, you don’t get too many more opportunities to see good ones to hit.” Hope that also means he going to stop taking the first strike, that also might be the best pitch he see's in his at-bat. Reducing the K's will go a long way to getting his average back, when Morneau won his battle title he had a large drop in his K%

Other than a six week period last year from July to mid August, it still looks like he being rushed. In Hicks case, it might not be being rushed, it he just might be a .220 hitter.

It's a no-risk signing, so I think it okay. If the Twins feel any pressure to keep him after June 1, it would be because he either crushing the ball or thing have gone horribly wrong with the major league roster. This will probably end up being a non-relevant signing. A little major league experience in AAA shouldn't be a problem.

I think your assumption might be wrong. Who said it was the price of FA's that stopped Ryan? Maybe he just believes in the in house options. The last two years he thought the starting pitching was a problem and signed 3 FA pitchers.

Here's the ERA+ over the last 3 years for Abad, Bastardo and Sipp Abad Bastardo SIpp 2013 114 163 81 2014 238 95 115 2015 97 129 203 I agree Abad is probably just an average pitcher, but I think we are waisting a lot of time being upset about not spending $7 million on a different average pitcher. My hope would be that they take a hard look at the young internal options and not wait until they are out of options before giving them a chance.

Agree, they should be low on payroll with the young players they have in their system. Instead of trying to spend an additional $15 million on the payroll, I hope they make a big splash in the international market this year. Use that money to get more controllable assets in the system.

Below is from the comment section, I think that give a pretty good explaination: The writer commits a really common statistical blunder when he says Mauer's candidacy is already extremely strong due to the fact that his WAR/162 is the highest of any catcher in baseball history. Mauer's numbers look better compared to Bench -- a far superior player: Bench's WAR/162 through his age 30 season was 6.33, and this number is actually "hurt" by the fact that he stayed on the field more and therefore had a bigger denominator -- because we're only looking at Mauer's twenties and haven't given him time to decline (which he's already doing) and lower that number. I'm sure this was considered, but it wasn't mentioned. To the point that catchers are historically underappreciated, it may very well be true that WAR fails to account for the difficulty of playing the position, pitch framing, etc; obviously this is a popular view among mainstream sabermetricians. If this is the case, then it's difficult to compare them to other position players using WAR. But leaving that aside, or even assuming that WAR could be tweaked somehow to account for this, there's no way you can adjust WAR for the fact that catchers, on average, play three-quarters of a season. They're not providing value during that time they're resting, and they're not providing value when their careers end sooner than other players. If you want to make this a Hall of Fame argument, you could argue for lowering the statistical threshold to account for the difficulties of playing catcher, but this has nothing to do with WAR itself Also when the author says "Is it rational, then, that a strong candidate for the title of greatest catcher of all-time has a per-162 game rate that’s so far below the best players at every other position on the diamond? Is it rational to believe that there have been no really great catchers in major league history?" -- I think there might be a failure to account for a sort of selection bias that undoubtedly occurs when clubs decide which position players will play. Great-hitting young catchers are routinely moved from behind the plate at a young age because teams want to maximize the value they can contribute. it happened with Biggio; it would have happened earlier with Mauer, had the Twins had their way; it's happened with countless other young catchers: teams want their best young hitters in the lineup every day and to not age in dog years. It's very possible that the talent pool of major league catchers is diluted because of this. A somewhat analogous situation is relief pitchers: the reason relief pitchers in general are lesser pitchers than starters is that managers and front-office people have their best pitchers start games, because that's how they can pitch the most innings and give them the most value. Relievers shouldn't -- note shouldn't -- be compared against other relievers, but against other players. But this gets into a long tangent about how JAWS is dumb and how it de-accounts for position, one of the fundamental strengths of WAR." 8:56 PM Jul 22nd

If we are using WAR for the HOF, Edmonds had a better career than not just Hunter, but also Mauer. But I think both Hunter and Mauer will get through the first year. Not sure anyone can rationalize why they don't vote for some players. Lance Berkman will be another high WAR player who probably will not be on the ballot long.

I think he'll end up like Tony Oliva and not make the hall of fame. It's getting harder to compare him to HOF catchers (Piazza caught 650 more games than Mauer) and if he keep playing 150 games he'll need to get 2,100 hits, he'll end up playing as many games as a non-catcher. If he continues to produce at the level of the last 2 years, he may even drop below a career .300 hitter.

Agree, below is Blaine Boyer's ERA+ compared to the FA pitchers: Blaine Boyer 167 Antonio Bastardo 129 Tyler Clippard 122 If you miss on the Boyer type of pitcher, you easily can release him and move on. But if you are locked in for 3 years for $6+ million per year and you miss on him, he's going to be on the roster.

Isn't that the same thought process we had when signing Nolasco to a 4 year contact? It's easy for us to say just eat the contract, it would be harder to continue to go to your boss and say that. Relief pitcher are up and down and Bastardo is a great example of that, he pitches well every other year. Given all draft picks spent on relief pitching and the pitchers in the system, I think giving a 3 year contact to a relief pitcher will be a bad decision.

2015 we saw the young bats starting to come up, hopefully 2016 will be the beginning of some of the young power arms showing up.

I agree with this, let's not continue to make the same misstake. Look at the Brewers, they had a surprise 2014 season but then fell apart in 2015. Now they are blowing up everything. The Twins need to find out if they can build value to move pieces, which hopefully enables them to ease in the prospects. I would like to see May in the rotation, but they the prior misstakes prevent it. He can fill a roll in the bullpen and they need to give Nolasco one more shot. If he sucks again this year or get injured again, you open up the spot. But you have higher ceiling pitchers that probably will get a starting chance before May, so let him work out of the pen this year. Just stay away from signing veterans to long term contracts. Let's start giving these opportunities to the prospects in the system.

This is what happens when you sign 3 mid-level free agent starters to long term contracts. May is not going to be an elite starter, so they are not going to eat salaries on the possibility that May can develop into a 2 or 3 starter. Let's just hope the Twins have learned not to continuing doing this with the other positions.

I like the minor league signings, as much as we hate on Blaine Boyer I would gladly take relief pitcher with a 2.75 ERA at the end of the year. Even if he can't strike out anyone.

I agree, lets not make the same mistakes we have with the starting pitching. Start building up the young bullpen, instead of bring in veterans on multi year contract. We have multiple pitchers age 23-26 who should be able to contribute 60 innings a year at the major league level. I don't need them to sign the Nolasco of relief pitching just because we want a veteran in the bullpen.

I have to admit, I not the biggest fan of Ryan but this is getting a little old. He trades HIcks prior to the winter meeting - he acted too soon. He doesn't pick up a RP in the meeting - what is he waiting for? No wonder he tried to retire early.

Not offering Fien would show a big change of direction for the Twins. But on a 1 year deal, he will probably end up being a better investment than a 3 year deal for a FA.

I'm against signing one of the free agent to a 3 or 4 year contact. We done it the last couple years with the starting pitching and that hasn't worked out. With the surplus of back of the rotation starters and Plouffe, they have trade options. I think a better opiton would be to start converting some of the starters or make a trade to fill out the bullpen. We have a lot of arms that should be ready soon in the minors, so let's not lock up veterans to long-term deals. You can alway make trades during the season if you need to pick up a player.

On the field, I think sometimes we forget that we are not dealing with a fantasy team and things like leadership and a winning attitude matter. Not all winning is either stat based or luck. I think Hunter’s contributions to the team is often undervalued by some, but not by the team or organization Off the field, unfortunately a large number of people agree with Hunter’s beliefs. Probably some in the clubhouse, but they are just not vocal about the beliefs. But with Hunter, you knew where he stood and you could agree or disagree.

In 2009, Mauer had to stay behind in Flordia for April to rehab. I alway wonder if they really worked him hard and made him stronger, because he came back in May an hit 11 HR's during the month. Which is many home runs as he has hit in any year afterwards.