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Taildragger8791

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Everything posted by Taildragger8791

  1. Taildragger8791
    A guy with a near-40% strikeout rate might rankle some old school feathers, despite usually putting up otherwise acceptable stats.
  2. Taildragger8791
    Methinks the results are starting to catch up to the process...
  3. Taildragger8791
    Buxton says Sano can handle his own homerun trot, thankyouverymch.
  4. Taildragger8791
    I'm curious what impact shifting has on defensive metrics like that. Regularly playing Sano in the hole or on the other side of 2nd base isn't really a fair assessment of how he performs as a 3rd basemen. But then again if that's the direction the game is going maybe the skills required for 3rd basemen are changing also, pushing guys like Sano across the diamond or elsewhere.
  5. Taildragger8791
    The difference there is Rosario always demonstrated an elite ability to get the bat to the ball. As he got better at pitch recognition and toned down the free-swinging he cut down the strikeouts and made more quality contact. I don't really see them as the same thing, but it does demonstrate the drastic improvement possible when a guy learns to lay off unhittable pitches. It took Rosario a while to get there because he had an elite skill to fall back on, so maybe Sano will follow a similar trajectory.
  6. Taildragger8791
    He's having as good of at bats as he can for his contact ability. The strikes/strikeouts have to come from somewhere though, which in this case means he's swinging and missing/fouling balls. Sort of agrees with the eye test. I don't think of Sano as an undisciplined free swinger, I think he just has difficulty recognizing and hitting low breaking balls. That leads to a steady diet of said breaking balls which runs up the count and leads to walks and swinging Ks. I doubt a player can significantly improve their contact skills at this point in their career, but if he learns to spit on breaking balls that fall beneath the zone it'll be a significant game changer for him and the Twins.
  7. Taildragger8791
    After an initial adjustment period (something we've seen from Rooker at every level), he's been putting up good numbers for almost 2 months now: .323/.447/.559 in 114 plate appearances. 15% walk rate, but still carrying a 35% strikeout rate over that stretch. The strikeout rate has been dropping as the season goes along though, so that's positive. His BABIP is off the charts at .532, so there's some regression coming in there. But otherwise his stat line looks like a Sano 2.0. I'm not sure the TD forums could handle a lineup with TWO Sanos in it...
  8. Taildragger8791
    Miguel Sano’s uniqueness aside, I don’t see how you can say strikeouts are the same as other outs. The Twins won tonight partially because Rosario advanced Polanco on a deep fly out, allowing him to score on a wild pitch. If you have a lineup of guys striking out over 1/3rd if the time you don’t get as many of those kinds of opportunities to stress the defense or induce productive things to happen. It somehow works for Sano because he sells out and hits the ball so dang hard when he eventually makes contact. I like the risk/reward profile in the 5-7 slots in the lineup, but there are 4-5 other hitters on this team I’d rather have up in a big spot to extend a rally.
  9. Taildragger8791
    Just curious where you looked that up. On the Statcast page he ranks 59th in barrels/PA and 24th in barrels/Batted Ball Event. Sano definitely puts a wicked charge into the ball when he makes contact, nobody can dispute that. https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/statcast_leaderboard?year=2019&abs=30&player_type=resp_batter_id It's kind of a weird name for that statistic since it's influenced so heavily by exit velocity. A hitter with elite power should be near the top of that leaderboard since they generate exit velocity more easily, opening up the window of launch angles they can get Barrel credit for. It doesn't mean the contact was better or worse, just that they hit it harder. Theoretically a guy like Ben Revere could square up balls at an optimal launch angle all day and not get as many "Barrels" as guys near the top of that list. I just noticed ByungHo Park was ranked 11-12 in 2016. Weird.
  10. Taildragger8791
    As it is it seems like he's the rare cookie that can be surprisingly productive despite his serious contact issues and being a bit of a guesser at the plate. It's unorthodox and causes a lot of heartburn at times, but as mentioned above he produces over the aggregate which is great for the regular season. It works in this lineup because they aren't dependent on him putting the ball in play a lot, and it is a fun luxury to have hitting #6 or #7. I don't think you can totally ignore the results against individual pitches or in individual at-bats though, because the opposing scouts sure don't. He still mostly feasts on fastballs and mistake pitches, while struggling pretty mightily against almost everything else. Those opportunities will dry up against top notch pitching and coaching in the playoffs. If he swings through a fat one in the zone he might not get another one all day. I still think in this lineup that might be ok as long as the K-rate doesn't balloon to 50%, but I'm very interested to see how it all plays out. This might be the year we finally get to see how it all works over an extended run and with real playoff implications on the line.
  11. Taildragger8791
    The MiLB season is as weird as the MLB season, but for the opposite reason. Injuries and underperformance have stalled out progression for almost all the top prospects. On the bright side, some lesser-hyped guys and guys who were losing some shine are now starting to emerge.
  12. Taildragger8791
    And on the very next pitch Bremer once again fooled me with another one of his misleading calls on Sano's towering 130 foot pop out. That tricky Dick.
  13. Taildragger8791
    This. Is. Awesome. It would be criminally negligent not to find one more solid bullpen arm to spread the load around, but overall the top 4-5 guys have been pretty solid when they aren't overused. I think a lot of that is credit to the rotation for going 6-7 innings consistently. Adding another #3 or better starter would be a dream scenario. That pushes Pineda to the pen, and come playoff time you get to move a couple starters behind the outfield wall as well. Now things start looking pretty solid on the mound.
  14. Taildragger8791
    If this started to catch on with high-end prospects I imagine MLB will try to negotiate with foreign leagues to take away this option for draftees. Or simply apply some good old fashioned collusion to ice out the kids that try it unless they turn into a top talent. Anything to avoid treating minor leaguers better.
  15. Taildragger8791
    The 2nd and 3rd at bats were better last night but big fly outs are still just fly outs. When you predominantly try to hit balls in the air you're going to get a lot of those. Nothing wrong with that, but there's no "almost a homerun" credit just because he's strong and hits them hard and high. The actual homerun came against a guy that was feeding him 4-seamers for some inexplicable reason, and Sano did exactly what you'd expect and sent one to the moon. Classic Sano. I'm more than willing to be patient because I see the talent and he won't get better without opportunity. I just struggle to believe he'll sustain those rosy per-162 numbers over an actual full season or against playoff-caliber pitching unless he learns to survive against breaking balls. For his career he strikes out at a 45%-55% clip against anything that isn't a fastball/sinker/cutter. Sure, he'll continue to run into hangers, bad pitchers, or guys who stupidly challenge him on fastballs. That's not a process that leads to consistent success when competition gets tougher. But maybe he's the rare historic bird that makes it work. Also, I'm not sure where the .340-.350 OBP or 30% strikeout numbers came from. His career OBP is .334 and he's never had a strikeout rate below ~36%.
  16. Taildragger8791
    It looks like his timing is coming back on fastballs. Buttrey didn't trust his slider and was stuck feeding Sano his favorite pitch and got punished for it. Yay for us. Unfortunately he's still lost against good breaking pitches, which isn't unexpected. That first at bat today was one of the worst I've ever seen. Woof. For me the #1 thing I want to see out of him this year is just the ability to survive against decent breaking balls. He doesn't have to crush them, but he can't continue striking out at 45%-55% against sliders/curves/splitters/change ups.
  17. Taildragger8791
    How does Arraez have no options? This is his first time being called up. He's definitely a natural born contact hitter which the top of the lineup could use. And it's a nice change from all the swing-and-miss power hacking in today's game. They have the infield depth to DFA Adrianza but I'm not sure they'll pull the trigger this quickly. I suspect he'll get optioned, but is now the first choice to call up when an injury replacement is needed.
  18. Taildragger8791
    This is my assumption as well. Analytics may have derived an optimal lineup based on everyone's hitting profiles. And from a more qualitative perspective, there's something to be said for consistency and keeping every day the same regardless of how yesterday went. You don't have to think about how your lineup slot that day impacts your role, or how hitting behind/in front of someone different changes how you're pitched to. Maybe none of that really matters much, and I agree with Riverbrian that I expected to see matchups factored in a little more. But it's awfully tough to argue against a strategy that's resulting in one of the best offensive outputs in the league (and the best we've ever seen from a Twins team).
  19. Taildragger8791
    As painful as it could get, I don't think you do anything with Sano other than keep playing him all year. He needs the opportunity to make and demonstrate progress. If he doesn't perform then he lives near the bottom of the lineup and loses playing time to guys who can perform. Especially if playoffs come around. I think that sends a message that resonates better than a demotion would, and it's the beauty of having a deep lineup. Such an excellent motivator for him to stay focused and keep improving his game.
  20. Taildragger8791
    I didn't push for that either. I'm pretty clearly against making any decision on short sample sizes, and would rather look at a larger window of performance as well as the process that led to the results. The results will ebb and flow over short stretches because it's baseball, but as long as the process/approach are solid it should self-correct. He's in a comfortable spot and producing, so I'd let him continue to mature and establish himself for a while before yanking him up and down the order. I'd also want to see that OBP stay up before putting him at leadoff. Over the first several weeks he's shown that it's finally clicking and he's found an approach/process that works for him. I'd say the fact that he experienced a mini-slump and dug out of it without it snowballing on him shows that he's growing and maturing as a professional hitter.
  21. Taildragger8791
    You’ll have a hard time being happy with anyone’s consistency when your measuring stick is an arbitrary week and a half out of a 6 month season. And even that stretch of performance for Buxton wasn’t in the unplayable territory we’ve seen before.
  22. Taildragger8791
    Between injuries and poor performance, that Top 20 Prospect Summary is a pretty rough read most days. There's only a few names regularly lighting up the board, and it's rarely the ones we're really counting on. Hopefully the switch flips sometime this summer...
  23. Taildragger8791
    This kind of game is hung on the front office for treating the bullpen like it can just be cobbled together on the fly from spare parts.
  24. Taildragger8791
    Personally I don't put much weight on his numbers in A-ball. I expect dominance from any major leaguer against kids living on fastballs and sketchy secondary pitches.
  25. Taildragger8791
    I wouldn't call it punitive unless he ran out of rehab time and got optioned. He missed spring training plus a quarter of the season, and his strikeout/walk rate was pretty abysmal at AA/AAA which suggests he's not seeing the ball well yet. It's perfectly reasonable to give him the full rehab time to shake the rust off and make sure he's set up for quicker success when he gets here.
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