Cap'n Piranha

I'm not super well-versed in CBA legal minutia, so I'll defer to you on that (since IIRC, you are an actual law-talking guy--credit to Lionel Hutz!). That being said, I do think it's silly that we have a system in which an action is rendered permissible or non-permissible based solely on public statements. As Dman has said, everyone knows that when a hot-shot prospect doesn't break camp with a team, it's not because they think he's 12 minor league games away from being ready. As for the language issue, I think the operative work in your statement is "seems". You are interpreting his comments through a racial lens that may or may not have existed, and ascribing motive to Mather for which I've yet to see any proof (that is, outside of these two comments, which as far as anyone not familiar with the two players in question knows are absolutely truthful, have we any reason to suspect Mather harbors racist viewpoints?) If he had said something along the lines of, "it takes extra work to integrate non-white players because they never speak even passable English", I'd agree that he's engaging in racist stereotypes, and some form of punishment is absolutely warranted.

It is the height of 2021 that he has already been forced to resign for this. I couldn't agree more that it's ridiculous we're talking about people being upset at a guy for talking about widely-known truths. The only thing I disagree with is the stealing a year thing--the CBA allows teams to get an extra year of team control by bringing a player up after the season has starts. It would be idiotic for teams to not play within that rule. If the players truly hate it, they have a great opportunity to fix it after this season when the labor deal they freely and willingly agreed to expires.

Hmmm. Definitely said a lot of things he didn't need to say. As far as any of it being offensive, I'm not so sure of that; saying someone speaks bad/terrible/not good English is not offensive, if the person does, in fact, speak bad/terrible/not good English. I have good English, pretty poor Spanish, and non-existent anything else; I would take absolutely no offense to anyone telling me my skills in a language other than English are not good, because they would be correct. Was there any upside to saying this about a couple of his employees? No, and therefore he shouldn't have said it, but it's not offensive. Kyle Seagar will be 34 before the 2022 season starts, has not put up more than 3.5 WAR since 2016, and would need to be paid $15M for 2022. If Kyle Seagar isn't fully aware that he needs to have a good year this year in order to get that option, or anything close to it from another team in free agency, then he has a bad agent or is in denial. Everyone knows teams keep players down to maximize service time. I'm not sure why we're shocked a team executive spoke to a policy that is almost universally employed--blame the Union for allowing that policy to exist in the first place, rather than something far more common sense like set amount of times after drafting/signing as an international FA which then triggers free agency. He spoke about prospect timelines because every team has those. The host's assertion that this means these players could OPS 2.000 and still not get a call-up until 2022 is ridiculous--the Mariner's president was simply speaking to the current timeline, much as the Twins aren't planning on Canterino being in the majors until 2022. But if a couple people get hurt, and Canterino is shredding the minors, they'll call him up; same with the Mariners. The video did not show the Mariner's president stating he thought the area he forces his employees to park in is unsafe, so I'm not sure if that actually happened. If it did, and he does not provide security for his employees, then that's not a good move, and should be changed. As for not letting his employees park nearby, that's fairly standard for most businesses; closer spots are reserved for customers. As a Seattle resident, I can also attest to the fact that there is not a wealth of available parking by the stadium, because in the immediate vicinity is Elliott Bay, an event center, the NFL stadium, a number of office buildings, freeway off-ramps, a bus depot, mass transit lines, and rail-lines and a depot. There's not a ton of space that could easily be converted into big parking ramps, so it's not surprising parking is so expensive--it's supply and demand. That same concept holds for all the free agents, who despite what the host thinks, are not being paid less than what they're worth. Worth is a subjective concept--I can say my labor is worth a million dollars, but if I can't find any employer who agrees, than I'm not actually worth a million dollars. That's what's happening with the unsigned free agents right now--teams are telling them what they believe they're worth, and to this point they disagree. What the Mariner's president was saying is that with time before the season starting to run out, those players will need to reduce their ask, or go without playing. That's not collusion, any more than Amazon, Google, Facebook, Netflix, Apple, etc not paying me a million dollars a year is colluding against me.

I would imagine in return for cost certainty, and guaranteed profitability, the owners would be more than happy to increase the pay for all minor leaguers (say $25k for DSL, $50k for Rookie and A-, $100k for A+ and AA, and $150k for AAA). They would also, I'm sure, raise the salaries for pre-free agency major leaguers, knowing that they wouldn't have to pay more on the back end, what with team/player caps. They would probably also get rid of the service time system, and implement somthing along the lines of free agency falling after the season in which a player turns 27. They may even eliminate the qualifying offer.

Yeah, this is off. In 2020 the (normal) average MLB payroll was $158.9M, which equates out to $4.77 BILLION in player salaries, so pretty much 48%. This means that every team would average $175M to pay for all other expenses, including taxes. Obviously though, a number of teams aren't getting anywhere near $175M in excess revenue--they're probably not even close to $75M, and would still need to pay corporate taxes, all the coaches, all the team staff, stadium operating costs, draft picks, minor leaguers, and any investment in the organization, all before the owner even makes a dime. The Yankees, Dodgers, Red Sox, Cubs, and a few others have enough excess to pay the salaries at the top of the scale. 15 to 20 organizations do not (unless they want to lose money, and again, why should owners lose money on something they're spending tens, if not hundreds of millions on annually).

You're right--they don't care about winning. They care about Winning (well, maybe not Cleveland. But that's what happens to a franchise when a Dolan is in charge). Baltimore and Pittsburgh could have signed Bauer, Realmuto, and traded for Lindor while giving him a $300M contract, and they would still not be serious contenders for a World Series title. If you want to blame anyone, blame Houston. The Astros demonstrated you can tear everything down and not try to win for 3-5 years, spend almost nothing, and rebuild your organization, and then resume caring about both winning and Winning. Or blame the Rays, who have never had a payroll above $80M, are currently at $28M (less than half the league average), and yet are still a favorite to make the playoffs. Or to be perfectly honest--blame the players. The players absolute refusal to agree to any kind of salary cap, whether individual or team, so long as it is paired with a salary floor, is why some teams can spend and others can't. Do you really think the owners wouldn't agree to a structure whereby they must spend at least $120M, but no one could spend more than $170M, and then adjust those numbers annually based on revenue increase/decrease?

I wasn't aware Darvish pitched for the Dodgers in 2019/2020. I don't think any poster actually wants the Pohlads to pocket money. I think many posters understand that it's not ridiculous for people who spend well into the nine figures annually on an entity to want to make some money in the process, so no, I'm guessing that's not the point the poster was trying to make. The vilification of owners as greedy, selfish misers gleefully victimizing players and public alike is simply cartoonish, ridiculous, and laughably inaccurate.

I didn't see the post, so I'm speculating here, but I'm guessing the point was that in the past two years, the Dodgers have had 9 pitchers make 10 or more starts for them (all other pitchers with at least 1 start combine for a total of 10 starts). Of those nine, eight started their career with the Dodgers, with Rich Hill being the exception. Five of them were drafted and developed, with the other three signing out of Japan, Korea, and Mexico (Ryu, Maeda, Urias), for a combined total of about $110M--each was then tied to the Dodgers for the first 6 years of their Major League Career. When taking into consideration Maeda's incentives, and the maximum possible arbitration raises for Urias, call it another $100M. So the Dodgers would have paid, at most, ~$210M for 18 seasons of starting pitching, or not quite $12M per year. I think that's the point the poster was making--the Twins should strive to draft and develop, and then look to the international markets for their pitching. The Dodgers have won 8 straight titles, with only one true free agent splash on the pitching side (Greinke, who only pitched 3 years in LA), and it's because they have been great at getting pitching in other places. If the Twins could do the same, perhaps we wouldn't have to lament their inability to sign elite FA pitching quite so much.

Last year the Twins averaged 36 plate appearances a game--over 162 games, that's 5,832 PA's. The Twins could give 12 players each an average of 486 PA's; I can only think of 11 players/platoons the Twins really need to worry about getting PA's for (Garver/Jeffers, Sano, Arraez, Polanco, Simmons, Donaldson, Kepler, Buxton, Cruz, Rooker/Cave, and Kiriloff/Larnach). As such, if there were no injuries, I think the 8 guys listed by themselves would get about 525 PA's, with the other 3 platoons resulting in 250 to 300 PA's each. Obviously, there will be injuries this year, just for Buxton, Donaldson, Simmons, Arraez, and Cruz the over/under on games missed has to be at least 150. What the Twins have managed to do is create a lineup that shouldn't have any truly weak links. If the ideal lineup is Garver, Sano, Polanco, Simmons, Donaldson, Kepler, Buxton, Arraez/Cave/Rooker, Cruz, then your bench consists of Jeffers, 2 out of Arraez/Cave/Rooker, and then either Kiriloff or Blankenhorn.

Last year, 61% of Arraez' plate appearances came out of the 6th or 7th spot--meaning he didn't have the big boppers to drive him in. As a result, he only scored 6 runs when hitting in those slots, compared to 10 runs when hitting anywhere else. He got on base 22 times in his 74 PA's from the 6 and 7 spot, leading to the breakdown below, out of 121 total PA's, 44 times reaching base, and 16 runs scored Hitting 6th or 7th--74 PA's (61%), 22 on base (50%), 6 runs scored (38%) Hitting anywhere else--47 PA's (39%), 22 on base (50%), 10 runs scored (62%). Arraez didn't score more runs for the inverse of the reason Eddie Rosario had so many RBI's--Eddie got to hit cleanup behind our best hitters (including two best OBP guys), and Arraez often had to hit lower in the order after our best hitters. Also, your assertion that hitting homers is an easier way to score runs than getting on base is quite incorrect--for it to be true, half or more of all runs scored would have to be as a result of a homerun. Over the last 5 years, there have been 97,767 runs scored and 26,380 homeruns hit. For homers to account for half of all runs scored, they would have to account for 48,884 runs, which averages out to 1.85 runs per homer. That seems low, but as solo homeruns are rising as a percentage of total homeruns (3 of the top 5 seasons in history in terms of solo homerun percentage have been in the last 5 years, with a fourth year at number 8--caveat; the article I'm referencing which is linked below is from early May 2019). This means that if we assume over the last 5 years 58% of homeruns have been solo (which is in all likelihood low, as 2016, 2017, and 2018 were all at 59%, and 2019 was at 60% when this article was written), 15,300 of the 26,380 homers hit were solo, or 11,080 were not solo. Subtracting 15,300 from the 48,884 run figure which represents 50% of runs, means the 11,080 non-solo homers would need to account for 33,587 runs, or an average of 3.03 runs per non-solo homer. By definition, that means there would have to be more grand slams hit than 2 run homers--since the highest number of grand slams ever hit in a single season is 176 in 2000, we can safely say more runs are produced without homers than with them. Scoring runs with homers is certainly more efficient (fewer batters/greater chance for multiple runs), but it is not easier. https://tht.fangraphs.com/franmil-reyes-and-the-rise-of-the-solo-shot/#:~:text=And%20if%20you%20are%20wondering,is%20eighth%20highest%20since%201920. https://www.baseball-almanac.com/hitting/higs5.shtml

Self-quote, as I couldn't edit the original post, and forgot to include the link to my post. http://twinsdaily.com/topic/44139-updated-playoff-format-a-proposal/

I like the proposal--I actually did a similar thing a couple months ago on this site (see below). One thing; the number of games potentially needed in rounds 2 and 3 is off. For round 2, the max number of games the series could go is 2 (either the team with the better record will win the one game it needs to advance, or the team with the lesser record will win both games, and therefore advance). Same thing in round 3--the team with the better record will either win 2 of the first 4 games, and thereby advance, or they will go 1-3 (or 0-3), and lose to the team with the lesser record by game 4. Other than that, it's super intriguing, and I would be all in support of (almost) any proposal that moves us closer to a true postseason tournament.

In 3,900 career innings at short, Polanco has essentially the same UZR/150 (-10.9) as Araaez does in 650 career innings at 2nd (-11). Now, there's a huge swing between 2019 and 2020, so maybe that number is low and Arraez is better than this number shows. But generally speaking guys get better defensively when they go from short to second, so if Arraez is just as bad at second as Polanco is at short, it seems pretty clear Polanco will be better at second than Arraez. That being said, I'm an Arraez guy, and I would prefer to leave him at second and make Polanco the utility guy. A previous poster mentioned that Arraez could be Tony Gwynn; Luis actually has better numbers than Gwynn at the same point in their careers--Arraez walks more and has more power, but also strikes out more. However, given the relative injury proclivity of all four of our non-1B infielders, I do think it's a pretty decent chance that at least one will be on the IL at any given point. Therefore, I'm not too worried about this; if you assume 4 PA a game for each of these positions (which is probably low), that's 1,944 PA's that can be handed out, or essentially 500 per player. Add in a couple of outfield games for Arraez and some DH days (Cruz will undoubtedly have a couple of stints on the IL, or not be on the team at all), and I feel confident that even with relatively good health, all four of these guys will qualify for the batting title.

If by not "all-in" you mean the Twins haven't traded away half of their top prospects and given out $300M in free agent money, then I suppose yes, they're not all-in. However, if that's your definition of all-in, I don't think the Twins will ever be all-in unless MLB institutes a hard salary cap. This is a great deal, as it maximizes the Twins flexibility, both this year and beyond, while limiting our risk to his decline which could happen at any time. Given that next year's free agent market for shortstops is insane, the Twins could probably sign Simmons again next year if they wanted to for about the same price, if not less, even if he does have a good year.

In the minors in 2019, Arraez played 430 innings on defense--37% at 2B, 35% at 3B, 25% at SS, and 2% in LF, so it's not like he hasn't dabbled at positions other than second. In 2019, for the Twins, he actually played 35 innings at short, 130 at third, and 161 in left, which means 46% of his time actually came not at 2B. That being said, given his knee issues, I do think 2B is the best spot for him, but if Polanco is the primary 2B with Arraez the utility, and not the other way around (which is the way I would prefer it), I assume Arraez plays once a week at third, twice a week at second (giving Polanco a rest one day, with the second day when Polanco spells Simmons at short), and then we go from there. Of course, as soon as one out of Donaldson, Simmons, or Polanco gets hurt (which is very likely given particularly Donaldson and Simmons' history), Arraez becomes a full time 2B/3B again.

From what I can see on Fangraphs, the Angels were actually 2.5 out of the playoffs (the Blue Jays held the 8th spot), but with only 5 games left to play, Fangraphs had them pegged at only a 0.4% chance to make it, as they also had the Mariners between them and the Jays. In the comments on MLBTR, Angels fans (who knows if this is true) were also saying that the Angels had already informed Simmons they wouldn't be bringing him back. Given this, and the possibility of other factors that are not known (maybe someone in his immediate circle got Covid, the Angels haven't been the best-run organization so maybe he was tired of it), I don't think it's crazy that an injury-prone player would want to avoid a potential injury playing essentially meaningless games for an organization that wasn't going to be a future employer. I don't particularly like guys quitting on seasons, and I wish he hadn't, but I'm willing to accept that 2020 was a totally bizarre year, and accept that bizarre things happening was always going to be de rigeur.

The link below explains much of the issue with Ruth's lack of MVP's. To sum up, there was no MVP award given starting in 1915, until a new version was instituted for the 1922 season. That award lasted until 1929, and could not be won by the same player twice. The current iteration of the MVP award did not start until 1931--Ruth never won one of these, and really only had the numbers to merit consideration in 1931 and 1932. Lefty Grove won in 1931 on the strength of his 31 wins across 288 IP with a 2.06 ERA--he was the ace of an A's team that won 107 games and lost the World Series in Game 7. Jimmie Foxx won in 1932, based on his .364/.469/.749 slash line (1.218 OPS) with 58 homers and 169 RBI. That was the right choice, as Foxx outdid Babe in all the major categories other than OBP, and was better by both WAR and wRC+ as well. By 1933, Babe slipped to 6th in the league in WAR (Foxx won MVP again, with 50% more WAR than Babe), and in 1934, Babe only played in 125 games, and didn't qualify for the batting title--even if he did, he "only" put up 5.2 WAR in those 125 games, compared to Lou Gehrig's 10.7 in 154. In 1935, Babe only played 28 games, recorded just 0.2 WAR, and never played again. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_Most_Valuable_Player_Award

Ted Williams is the greatest all-around batter in baseball history. His lowest OBP ever was .372, in the year in which he turned 41--that was also the only year his OPS was ever below 1.000. The next year, when he turned 42, his OBP was .451, and he OPS'd 1.096 (for comparison's sake, Mike Trout has more seasons under a 1.000 OPS than above, and has never been higher than a 1.088 OPS; Ted Williams, by OPS, was at age 41/42 a better batter than Mike Trout has ever been). For his career, Williams took almost 3 walks for every strikeout. He had FIVE seasons with an OBP over .500, and finished with a .482 career OBP. His strikeout rate climbed above 10% only once (if you exclude the 1952 season where he only played in 6 games), and that was in his final season, playing at 41/42. He also recorded 1.6 extra base hits for every strikeout, and only had one season with more strikeouts than XBH (1959, his penultimate season). Mike Trout has never had a season with more XBH than strikeouts. As has been mentioned, Williams lost 3 entire seasons to war, the vast majority of another (1952, only 6 games played), and most of a fifth (1953, only 37 games played). From 1941 through 1954, excluding the two shortened seasons, Williams averaged 33 homers a season--give him 165 more homers (while taking away the 14 he actually hit in 1952-1953), and he finishes with 672 homers--more than anyone not named Ruth, Aaron, or Bonds). Williams had the peak performance (4 straight seasons of WAR above 10.5; it probably would have been 7 if not for WWII). Williams had the longevity (13 individual seasons above 6 WAR, with the last coming 18 years after the first). Add to the fact that Williams defense and baserunning was generally a negative, and the fact he compiled as much WAR as he did is remarkable. To wit, Mike Trout's best ever wRC+ is 188; that is Ted William's career average wRC+.

You're right, we do have a lot of those guys in house already, albeit all with question marks. Now we have one more, which means you're that much less likely to have all of your options fall flat on their face. Count me as one of the people that want to see improvement, and I would not call this improvement so much as I would call it insurance against decline. That being said, the offseason is not over yet. There are still players that can be signed, and trades that can be made, so the frustration over lack of moves is at least partly attributable to impatience.

Small sample size is relevant to what happened only insomuch as it's being used to predict what will happen. For example, if you had predicted Reggie Jackson would hit homers in every at bat in the 1978 World Series, you'd be falling prey to small sample size bias.

To be clear, you're saying that in 2010 the offense scoring 7 runs across 27 innings was not an issue?

Just because it happens in the postseason doesn't make it any smaller of a sample size. It's still very few appearances, and while I probably exaggerated with the "completely flip" statement, his numbers can still dramatically change pretty quickly. Let's say he made 4 postseason starts for the Twins this year, and pitched 20 innings, at a 1.00 WHIP. His career postseason WHIP would drop to 1.51--still not great, but a 20% reduction. Any time you can alter a number by 20%, you're dealing with small samples, or outlier occurrences. For example, a pitcher who has thrown 150 innings would need 4 consecutive perfect games to lower his WHIP by 20%. Put another way, that pitcher would need 108 innings of 1 WHIP pitching to lower their WHIP by 20%. I believe you're right when you point out that the hitters are better in the playoffs. I'm sure that's a large factor in why Happ's postseason WHIP is higher. But this move isn't about finding a starter for the playoffs--it's about enduring the 162 game marathon to get there. It raises the floor, expands the depth, and allows the Twins to have a slightly stronger negotiating position, both with free agents, and potential trades. This was a good move, not a great one, but I don't see anyone calling this a great move.

A playoff rotation is generally 3.5 pitchers, so if J. A. Happ is our number 4, he'll be asked to make only a couple of starts, and by starts, I mean pitch 4-5 innings before the bullpen takes over. It's also worth pointing out that 15 appearances and 27 innings is fairly small sample size, and it would only take one or two good performances to completely flip those numbers. At any rate, the purpose of this move is not as much to win in the playoffs, as it is to make it easier to get to the playoffs. It's very hard to win in the playoffs if you had to ride your horses hard all the way to get there, and very much harder to win in the playoffs if you don't get there at all.

Seth is absolutely right--this move is about having 4 proven MLB starters that will hopefully cover 80% of your games. It's also about improving leverage (Falvine no longer HAS to get a starter), and putting the Twins in a position where Duran and Balazovic can be brought up when ready, as opposed to when needed. John Bonnes has pointed out several times on the GATG podcast that Falvine seems to prefer setting a floor early, and then raising the ceiling late. I would very much expect that the Twins are still in the market for upgrades to the starting staff, and while I'm not saying they will for sure make one, I wouldn't be surprised if they did.

Ummm, both Maeda and Pineda...