Sam Morley

F Shelton. Just throw us a GD bone and hire Punto.

Why? his power separates him from them, but they are similar a handful of other ways. They are all pretty much one tool players. Wallner is power; Julien and Miranda are hit. They’re all pretty clunky defenders.

Good points. I didn’t realize he went 0-12. Of course, 12 abs isn’t statistically significant. I just also remember thinking he was overmatched, not just unlucky with his contact. But I should back up; I do think he is an asset. His strengths make him a worthy trade candidate, and his flaws make a parting less painful. while tork has gone through failure, he’s also had success (30+ hr season), his tool grades give reasonable reason to hope that his high ceiling is still attainable, he would fill a positional need, and isn’t a challenge for the budget. it wouldn’t bother me to lose Wallner for a chance at tork’s ceiling.

Hahaha. Man, I hesitated when I added Wallner to that list. I’ve been out of the mix at TD for a few years, but I had a hunch this was probably a Wallner crowd. I get why guys like him. Massive power and really nice ops. But isn’t his ops buoyed by being platooned? I’d guess he also feasts on league avg and worse pitching but isn’t doing much against anything quality. I mean he pretty much crumbled in his playoff showing in 2023.

I think if the twins could get torkelson for one of Julien, Miranda, or walner it would be a steal. We’ve seen real power from torkelson at the big league level, and though he hasn’t hit for avg yet, his hit tool grade is pretty good. Get him out of that park and a fresh start. There are types of trades I understand not wanting to do within the division, but I don’t see what the objection to this one would be.

I’ve been thinking abou Spencer torkelson as a trade target. Detroit is moving Keith to first and are trying to move Tork. Rumors about the Mets being interested. Wonder who Detroit would want in return.

"To suggest that Duffey is solely responsible for the two losses he's been tagged with is not quite fair." I think in disagreeing with this line, I am agreeing with the overall thesis of the article. Something Bill Buckner-esque aside, I don't see how a single player can be more solely responsible for a loss than this. It is truly as bad as it gets. The losses themselves are very significant, but it has the potential to be so demoralizing. I think it might also have the potential to be galvanizing or some other antonym of demoralizing, depending on how the manager responds. We all saw how pumped Buck was after he hit that go-ahead homer in the eighth inning. He wants to lead this team with his performance and with his energy. My guess is that after Duffey blew the game, Buxton was more pissed than deflated. I think if Duffey sticks around and keeps getting meaningful opportunities, then the situation is confirmed demoralizing. I think if Duffey is benched, relegated to garbage time, or best of all, outright cut, then the anger is validated. I can't see any risk in cutting him. Bullpen: next man up.

Does anyone think the rotation as is can get us to the trade deadline in contention?

This idea of “there are no starters or relievers, only pitchers” is flawed, and I think the flaw is basically a semantic one. Here’s what I’m thinking: 1. some pitchers are better than others, meaning they are better at getting hitters out than other pitchers. 2. the number of pitchers on a team is finite. 3. those pitchers have to pitch all the innings of the season. 4. the pitchers who are better than the others will have to pitch most of the innings of the season. Further, the larger the portion of “most of the innings” that the better pitchers pitch, the more success the group of pitchers as a whole will have at getting hitters out. 5. whether the better pitchers start or finish games seems statistically unimportant to me so long as they are pitching most of the innings, and the more the better (up to some point of diminishing return). (While it may be statistically unimportant in a vacuum, it might be very important to the humans who are the better pitchers, and to the fans of the game for aesthetic reasons). 6. So I say it’s semantic because we call the better pitchers starters and the others relievers. 7. the idea of using a bunch of failing starters (Velazquez, Tomlin, etc) in the bullpen isn’t creative, innovative, or forward thinking. It’s just every bullpen ever. 8. the only way to have more pitchers each pitch fewer of the same amount of innings is to expand the roster. If the roster size is expanded, the same strategy will be available to all of the teams, the talent will be diluted, and the teams with the most better pitchers will still win the most games.

https://youtu.be/929Wk-EWQ0s so after this, the tigers immediately sent burrows back to triple a, and now they’ve apparently cut him outright.

99% of major league hitting is about being able to turn on an inner third fastball. Major league pitching is working against that, luring hitters further and further toward and off the outer third. Every once in a while someone squeaks through the system to the show who fits into a 1% that looks for the ball on the outer third and tries to spray it away. There's room for success doing it because pitchers aren't prepared for it or just don't care. If you only have to face a guy like that once in a while, why would you waste time preparing for it? It's the same reason that there can always be one or two knuckle ball pitchers. I think pitchers probably will be able to adjust to Arraez. If they can beat him with fastballs on the inner third, he's done. If can show that he can turn on those from time to time and make them think twice, he'll be okay. His 2019 spray chart shows four home runs all to right field, so that seems like a good sign. Not sure what pitches they were off of though... Ten minutes later: Okay, there are four and I found the videos for all of them on MLB.com. 1 fb 93 center away, 1 curve 84 center, 1 fb 92 center in, 1 curve 83 down in. So there is one fastball edging close to the inner third and he really crushes it. Nice.

The "hit tool" is weird. The other tools are all pretty much natural physical attributes. Hitting mostly is a learned skill that is impacted by a bunch of natural physical attributes that aren't counted as tools: vision, quickness, hand eye coordination, intellect. There are some people who pick up the mechanics pretty quickly from a young age, and I suppose they get some due credit for being natural hitters. Most have to learn it though and reinforce with a lot of repetition and constant refinement. I would say that in either of these cases, the results are a player who can hit a fastball. That's the foundation of the "hit tool"... I think. My question is, how much does a hitter's ability to hit off-speed (or lay off it) influence the qualification of his "hit tool"? If a guy has the other tools, and the 'sub-tools', and has the proper hitting mechanics, looks great in BP, and crushes fastballs when he knows they're coming, then I think he has a good chance of learning/adjusting to off-speed. Hopefully that is the case with Keoni. If it's not, he's going to be a bust, and someone(s) in the FO made a poor selection. Being a great athlete is icing on the cake. Nobody wants a cake without the icing, but the f'ing cake is hitting fastballs. A .171 BA, with his speed, is a bad sign. Since we're doing comparisons... Byron Buxton was a raw, athletic HS 1st round pick. He murdered fastballs and his off-speed game didn't get exposed until he debuted in MLB. The Mike Trout comps don't make sense.

But it kind of reminds me of the days where pitchers like Johnson and Clemens were averaging 97 on their fastballs. eh? eh?

That isn't something that would be included in a medical report, is it? I don't understand the conflation of his medical history with his projection as a starter vs reliever. Is Boston saying that there is something in his medical history that predicts he will be a reliever? If so, what is it? Lots of starters have had TJ. Lots of starters have had shoulder impingement. Is Graterol himself saying he doesn't want to start anymore? This whole starter/reliever projection bit is nonsense. Boston could whine about him not projecting as a starter to devalue him/get another piece in the trade and then use him as a starter anyway.

How do you estimate how many times a healthy person can throw a baseball before they get injured? How can a person's physical condition be such that it is unsafe for them to throw 100 pitches in a game once a week but safe for them to throw 20 pitches in a game every other night? If there is something wrong with their body that prevents them from doing the former, wouldn't the same thing prevent them also from doing the latter? Starting pitchers turn into relief pitchers for one reason: they aren't good enough at pitching to be starters. They are saying Graterol can only handle a work load of 150-170 innings in a season. What does that mean? Does he get too tired to be effective after that? Is he getting too tired at that point in the season because of how hard he throws? That would make sense. That would jive with starters who convert to relievers and add 3-4 mph to their fastball. Presumably, most starting pitchers are not working near the top of their max range. They give up some heat in favor of stamina, and they have to become better at pitching to make up for the lost mph. My interpretation of Graterol being forecast as a reliever is that they don't think he's good enough at pitching to lose the mph. But I don't see what is stopping him from becoming better.

So, what is the scoop on Alex Verdugo? Looks like he hits for some average with low k rates, but also low walk rates and has pretty modest power. His stats remind me a bit of Rosario (with less power). I wonder who in the Twins minor league system is a good comparison. Boston got Verdugo and Graterol. Could we have ended up with Betts and Price if we had packaged a prospect similar to Verdugo with Graterol? Could we have then traded our extra corner OF (Rosario or Kepler) for Maeda and ended up with Betts, Price, and Maeda? Here's this from fangraphs on Verdugo: For all of Verdugo’s talent, concerns about his makeup have followed him since before he was drafted, with Keith Law (then of ESPN) noting questions about his level of motivation circa 2014, and the Baseball America Prospect Handbook 2018 writing, “Verdugo’s skills are undeniable, but criticism of his effort level and maturity have plagued him since his amateur days and were again prevalent in 2017,” referring, at the very least, to a dressing-down the rookie received from Rich Hill upon showing up to the ballpark late after oversleeping. In their 2019 edition, BA wrote, “Verdugo stays dialed in at the plate, but an indifferent attitude affects the rest of his game,” and noted lapses in his focus afield as well as a “slow motor” that “shows up on the bases, frustrating teammates and coaches alike,” while in their write up of the Dodgers system last year, Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel noted that “part of the reason teams have been asking for other Dodgers prospects in trades is due to some past off-field stuff.”

Yeah, and to add to this: Quality starting pitching is way harder to accomplish than quality relieving and takes more skill and ability. A quality starter has to successfully navigate their opponents lineup three times in an outing. Any marginally successful major league starting pitcher can be a quality reliever. Relievers are failed starters. Their stuff/stamina is only strong enough to get hitters out once in a game. Hitters don't often get a second chance at a reliever in the same series. If Graterol becomes a rotation ace for Boston, then this trade will sting; but this trade definitely makes the Twins better for 2020. It does not make them a post season competitor. IMO, it makes them the favorite for the division, if they weren't already. It gives them a pretty good chance of getting to the break and deadline in a competitive position where they will have the option of trading for starting pitching that can actually make a difference in the post season.

The Plouffe comp is so insulting.

I could be wrong, but I thought Larnach was pretty much a 1B/DH type that gets a pretty generous oh he can play some corner outfield, and it doesn't seem like there are very promising projections for Kiriloff's defense either. If that's about right, and the concern for Rosario is his recent poor defense ratings, which were obviously affected by his injured ankle, how could either of these guys be an adequate replacement for him? They would have to out perform him at the plate (which is very unlikely) because there defense, especially as rookies, is going to be worse.

Cheating is grey zone. It's unfair and that's on the wrong side of the spectrum. But it helps your team win, and that's on the right side of the spectrum. It's absolutely bad for the game and the people who regulate the game have a responsibility to prevent cheating and ensure fairness. Because of the greyness, and the inability of the regulators to take preventative measures, I don't think the players or coaches should be punished heavy-handedly. Fortunately, in this case, the specific form of cheating is incredibly easy and inexpensive to prevent. Rule: No screens, monitors, computers, cameras, personal tech, or communication devices of any type are allowed in the dugout or in the clubhouse. Exception: a rotodial landline to the bullpen.

Also, this was the most amazing combination of high and low tech ever to accomplish a task. They banged on a trash can with a stick. Unbelievable.

knowing what pitch is coming is a much greater advantage than the benefits of PEDs. I can't think of a bigger advantage a hitter could have. the punishments are ridiculous. the competitors should take advantage of the tools at their disposal. 'here guys, have all this tech- all these cameras, and this video, and these monitors, and these computers- use it all, but morally police yourselves on how.' get rid of video. no video for "player development". no video for in-game scouting. no video for review. no video for sign stealing. you can have post game access to the TV broadcast video that everyone else gets. you can take video in practice for development purposes. take the damn headsets of, get out of the video room, quit with the fussing and nitpicking, and play the game on the field. we've seen the game on juice- it was very interesting and also entertaining. I'm glad we saw it. I'm also glad that era is probably over. It wasn't pure human competition. now we've seen the game on tech- it's also very interesting and entertaining. at home, we probably all feel more included in the game than ever before. we get to make and discuss all this analysis- we get to feel like we know more about the game than people who have been in it at the highest level their whole lives because we can process some metrics they don't give a rip about. I'm glad for it, I've enjoyed it. I hope it's just another era of the history of the game coming to it's end. I want the game on the field, played by the best in the world, without the tech, without the over analysis, without the second guessing.

We aren't really going to know anything about the Falvey/Lavine team until the org's current top prospects come to fruition. My feeling is that the Twins have had a history of bungling the development of their most talented prospects. That paired with an inability/unwillingness to build the team in the offseason makes for a pretty impotent on field product. The team's success usually relies on a core of under the radar prospects who over achieve and establish themselves as solid big leaguers (Kepler, Polanco, Rosario, Garver, Dozier, Plouffe...) Of course, we're always wondering about regression and how long their success will last and whether we should try to trade them. If our prospects with the highest ceilings were being managed and developed to their potential, we wouldn't even be having this conversation about signing old guys in the off season. We'd be clamoring for extensions for our own stars. Berrios, Buxton, Sano- all enourmous talent/potential dramatically underachieving. Maybe Falvey and Lavine do not bear the full weight of those players' shortcomings. So, we will have to wait and see what becomes of Lewis, Kirilloff, and Graterol. I don't know what the problem is. I don't know what the answer is. I know that successful teams don't mess up their studs. My feeling in the past has been that the likes of TK, Gardy, TR, and Molitor were always trying to turn guys with buckets of talent into guys with limited talent who have to poke, and scrape, and hustle extra hard. It seems like the new guys could be a departure from that, including Baldelli, and that seems so much more important to me than what they can fanagle in the free agent market, especially given payroll restrictions.

Have to wonder how things would've turned out for Arcia under different management.

I don't understand why any team would be interested in this kind of acquisition. When you have a minor league system full of young players that you have scouted and developed, and know pretty intimately why would you sign someone who is older and about whom you have very little knowledge- and one of things you do know is that he has a fastball in the low 90s? These guys put up decent standard stats (with no analytical peripherals available) in leagues no one seems to have a bead on how to compare competitively to leagues in the States (is the Japanese league comparable to triple A or whatever the league is that the Saints play in?), and then they require a major league contract and roster spot. I don't care at all about the money. But the 20 lousy-mediocre starts it takes to find out he's at best not any better than Thorpe/Smeltzer/whoever is a huge loss for a competitive team. The Twins should be looking to sign starting pitchers/any player with the least amount of risk of not improving the team. A list pitcher types ranked starting with the least amount of risk of not improving the team: 1. Proven veteran Ace under 30 years old with immediate recent success 2. Proven veteran Ace over 30 years old with immediate recent success 3. Proven veteran Ace with relative diminished recent success 4. Solid veteran 2-3 with relative recent success 5. Unproven promising high ceiling young guy with recent Minor league/early MLB success 6. Any of the above (formerly) returning from recent injury with promising recovery expectations 7. Guy from Japan/Korean/Taiwanese/Cuban pro leagues absolutely dominating their league (ie Ohtani) 8. Solid veteran 4-5 with relative recent success and former 1-2-3 relative success 9. Minor league high ranked prospects in own system knocking on door 10. Minor league high ranked prospects in someone else's system knocking on door 11. Minor league low-non ranked prospects in own system knocking on door 12. Guy with former MLB success most recently pitching for an indy league team and dominating 13. Guy from Japan/Korean/Taiwanese/Cuban pro leagues with recent relative success 14. Guy from indy league with no MLB experience recently dominating I'd say Yamaguchi fits squarely in to #13 and should be a hard pass for any team with serious playoff aspirations in 2020. If you could sign him and put him at AA or AAA and see what happens, that seems great.