jorgenswest

If the Twins DFA'd Correia would anyone pick him up? It's worth a shot. I guess they can see if he gets through revocable waivers first. If anyone claims, they get to keep him. I would rather see Swarzak get the starts and Tonkin in the pen. Correia is not part of the solution.

Should the Twins make roster decision based on this skill? Should they use this data to help assess the skill? The data and study were available at the time they signed Ryan Doumit. Aaron Gleeman referenced it after the signing. Doumit continued to be at the bottom of the list after joining the Twins. The Twins signed him to an extension. It is clear that the Twins are either ignorant of the data or they believe it has little impact on the defense. While other organizations are playing poor hitting catchers that do well in framing pitches, the Twins continue to play Doumit. Have they found a hidden value? Are the other organizations over estimating the impact of managing the strike zone by trading offense for defense at catcher? Should the Twins have been using this data in making roster decisions? Should they stay status quo for 2014?

3-d http://baseball.physics.illinois.edu/FastPFXGuide.pdf Is there any other ratio in baseball where the same player has consistently been at the only one at the very bottom of the list for 7 consecutive seasons?

Pitch f/x data is from a three dimensional strike zone. Most graphics are 2 dimensional representation of that data.

Willingham has had three season of OPS better than .850 in his career... 2006, 2009, 2012. His projections from ZIPS, Oliver and Steamer going into this season ranged from .816 and .826. That was following a career 2012 season. His projections going into next season will be lower. While an .850 OPS is possible, it is certainly not a reasonable expectation. I doubt there are many teams that would claim him and commit the 9-10 million for a guy that really needs to be a DH. Kansas City has Butler and Gordon. Where would he play? They can't afford to commit that money to a pinch hitter. The Yankees need to get under the luxury tax next year. They can't commit 7 million in 2014. If they could, they would have signed Martin last offseason. How many National League teams would play him as their regular LF with his defense? I think there is a very reasonable chance that he will pass through waivers to the point that someone like the Rangers claims him. The Twins should take whatever they can get for him. If for some reason the Royals claim him as suggested above, the Twins should let him go. Give the burden of that contract to the low budget Royals, that would be a lot of dollars to invest in the DH spot.

A catcher has the opportunity to use his skill to influence strike zone. These are the k/bb ratios for Diamond by catcher since 2011. Mauer 3.0 (2.83 in 2013) Butera 2.07 Doumit 1.47 (1.29 in 2013) Hopefully the Twins will begin paying attention. Many teams are much further ahead of the curve. The Pirates, Yankees, Dodgers, Rays and Diamondbacks have been very intentional about seeking catchers with good receiving skills even of it meant a significant drop in offensive production. The Pirates shift from their 2011 catchers to 2013 catchers has had a dramatic effect on their pitching success. The Dodgers would prefer the offensively challenged Tim Federowicz over the much better hitting Ramon Hernandez.

He will be 31 next year. He is eligible for arbitration. It is likely that any team that takes him would do so for this year and nontender him. He will be less expensive if the Twins want to sign him after he is nontendered. I would prefer they look for someone younger in the winter. They have had success with Burton and Fien. Signing Sipp now and taking him to arbitration makes it almost certain he will on the opening day roster.

On sample size... The first offensive numbers to stabilize are strike out and walk rate. Stats like OPS for an individual player stabilize at 500 plate appearances. That isn't very helpful when looking at splits. It would take a while to get that many plate appearances into each side of the split. If anyone is interested... 525,600 Minutes: How Do You Measure a Player in a Year? | FanGraphs Baseball

He will be 27 next year. He is too old to let develop in the minors. The Twins need to decide if Florimon is the solution for the next few years. If not, Guerrero is a worthwhile risk. It is a risk they should take if they are willing to give him a starting job next year. This is a much wiser use of the free agent market for a team that should start rebuilding as opposed to signing a decline phase player. Florimon or Guerrero. That is the real decision Ryan needs to make with the help of the scouting department. If a position change to 2B or corner OF is necessary, Guerrero isn't nearly as valuable to the Twins or anyone else.

I think it is simply the randomness of sample size. Once he gets to 200 plate appearance for both day and night data sets, the strikeout and walk ratios might tell something if they were significantly different. It would take a few full seasons to get enough day game data for stuff like OBP to become reliable.

Thanks for the updates on Chris. This may be his last week until September. Willingham and Mastroianni could be ready in a week. He is in the lineup for today's day game. I don't share your same concern. His overall major league data is not large enough to merit any discussion. His splits couldn't possibly have any meaning other than random variation. I haven't seen career minor league splits for day/night. Is that the foundation for your observation?

Every organization should strive to emulate the Cardinals. They have maintained a very good farm system for many years without high picks. Some of the credit for their player development success goes to Jeffrey Luhnow who joined the Astros before 2012. With the help of two high picks and trades he has turned the dismal Astros farm system into one of the best in baseball. It will be interesting to see how important he was to the Cardinals success. The Twins have a good farm system. They need to develop those assets and keep adding to the talent. They need to have patience as those players struggle as they move up to the majors.

This type of waiver (not outright) can be thought of as recall waivers. At some point most teams will put most of their roster on these waivers in August. It is important to know that a player of claimed can only be recalled by the original team once in the month. The Twins will want to time it well and possibly have a potential deal in place before loading the waiver list with their roster.

Definitely my bias, but I enjoy watching defense and the defense in the outfield will be unwatchable. There will be a drop in CF, a huge drop in LF and it isn't possible to drop off from Doumit/Colabello/Herrmann in RF. The overall OF defense was adequate when Thomas was in LF and Hicks in CF. It will be the worst in baseball now. I guess I hope Arcia plays RF as that is his future spot if not DH. It still seems the best decision for Hicks, but the Twins should have found someone who can defend in the OF from among those that have been DFA'd this year. They should have seen this need the minute they traded Revere. Albers is not a ground ball pitcher. Good luck to him.

For our young pitching to develop, they need a good defense behind them. When they get a routine groundball, it needs to be turned into an out. That didn't happen consistently for the previous two years at SS. When they get a lazy fly ball hit off the end of the bat, they need to get more outs from the corners OFs than they get from Doumit and Willingham. When they throw a ball low in the strike zone, they need to get a strike call. When pitchers consistently get poor defense and catching, they try to fix something that in their pitching that wasn't necessary and that sets them back. A good defense will give them true feedback about their pitching and we need good defense to develop that pitching. You may not care who the Twins put out on defense, I hope the front office doesn't share your views. Arcia should have the tools to play RF in Target Field. Put him out there and demand hard work in improving that skill. Find guys with better range to play LF in Target Field. If the only guys they have that can defend that position are Thomas and Mastroianni, send them out there until they get someone better.

Mastroianni will need a spot when he returns.

I am with you on going young. The 1999 season was already a huge turn in going young. Look at the 1998 roster if you want to see old. Since 1998, only twice has both the weighted average pitcher age and hitter age been both over 28. This year and 2010. This isn't a rebuild. You don't rebuild with one of your oldest rosters in 15 years. This was hope that all of your veterans will defy injury and decline and all will somehow put up a peak season It is time to stop signing old guys to multiyear contracts. Go young as they did in early 80s and 1999-2001. Struggle. Grow and improve together. Set the foundation for the next successful winning run.

I hope Arcia is a better defender than we saw earlier this year. Our eyes confirm what BIS solutions found with his -8 defensive runs saved in 290 innings of LF. Thomas, on the other hand, has been very good in left field. The Twins have a big left field and need a good defender in that spot. I would rather see a Thomas/Mastroianni platoon there the rest of this season. Arcia has been playing mostly RF in AAA. I hope his arm is a plus in that spot to offset his range. The Twins don't need three guys that should only be a DH on the roster.

You caused me to check... Josmil Pinto 5'11" Chris Herrmann 6'0" Matthew Koch 6'0" I hope you are correct. Doumit is 6'1" so there is skill involved in this other than height. Height helps. You can't teach Joe to be 5'11".

The Twins have no more right to Pelfrey next year than anyone else. They can not force him to resign at a reasonable deal. At this point, a reasonable deal has been offered and rejected or the Twins are not interested in him returning. I assume that it has been offered and turned down. Pelfrey wants to go into free agency again. This time with a healthy arm. It is easy to understand why he wouldn't take a deal now without hearing from the other 29. The Twins have Albers under team control. They should invest innings in Albers.

Based on the pitches Albers throws, his low groundball rate and neutral to reverse platoon splits, successful pitchers he is most similar to are Bruce Chen and Barry Zito. There have been many with a similar profile that were not successful. While in the minors coming up, Chen and Zito had much higher strike outs rates than Albers. I don't know if it is possible to be successful and be a poor man's Bruce Chen, but that might be Albers. Yes. The Twins should call him up and give him starts. Why give Pelfrey starts? Unless he wants to agree to a Twins a one year extension(unlikely with Boras), the Twins should give the starts to Albers. There is no need to give the starts to Pelfrey so that he builds his value for someone else. I am sure he gives them the appearance of wanting to stay. It is smart business sense to give that impression. Signing a guy coming off TJS without a team option wasn't a good decision.

My last blog topic on catcher defense was last November. The trade of Butera has prompted a revisit. Through July 26 while Ryan Doumit was catching, 46 out of zone balls were called strikes and 205 in zone strikes were called balls. They convert it to a ratio which for Doumit would be 0.22 extra strikes/lost strikes. That ratio is the worst in baseball and the next for a current catcher is twice the ratio at 0.44. The data is from Baseball Prospectus. How much difference does that make in terms of runs? Mike Fast used Dan Turkenkopf's study showing that reversing a strike into a ball is worth 0.13 runs. You can and will argue that validity of both but many teams are using this work. Ben Lindbergh had a great series of interviews including executives, catchers, coaches, pitchers and umpires earlier this year. So Doumit had caught 291.2 innings through July 26. He had a net of 159 lost strikes. Converting that into runs and using a per 9 inning measure, Doumit has impacted the game by 0.64 runs per 9 innings this year. Many of you will join the Twins in ignoring this data. Shouldn't the Twins wonder why the Dodgers with a back up catcher with an OPS of .590 didn't go after Doumit? Instead, they added Butera. Butera can't hit. He can catch. Through 2012 had been about even in the strike/ball counts. He is very good in other measures and may be very good in receiving the ball. Earlier this year Ramon Hernandez was the Dodgers back up catcher with an OPS over .700. They dropped Hernandez for the more skilled receiver in Federowicz. Federowicz can't match Hernandez' hitting. He can catch. Look for quotes from Steve Yeager in the top article below about the Dodgers and catcher defense. Do you want the Twins to continue to ignore this data from pitch f/x? Could it be that the Rays, Yankees, Dodgers, Pirates and Diamondbacks are off base in seeking catchers for their ability to receive the ball? How much does Doumit cost the team with his defense? It must be something, but 0.64 seems very high. Even if it is half that, is it possible that we have been employing the wrong back up catcher this year? My sources http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9275754/studying-art-pitch-framing-catchers-such-francisco-cervelli-chris-stewart-jose-molina-others http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=21363 http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=15093 http://subjspeak.blogspot.com/2012/12/catcher-framing-part-1.html Edit: to add offensive comparison. Doumit has created 40 runs this year (Baseball Reference) in 372 plate appearances. That is 0.43 runs per 4 plate appearances. Last year, Butera created 8 runs in 122 plate appearances or 0.26 per game. The difference in the offense while playing Doumit is about 0.17. Could Butera have made up that difference with his defense at catcher? The Twins probably expected Doumit to do as well as last year's 0.51 per 4 PA. That is 0.25 runs per 4 PA better than they might have expected from Butera. Did the Twins employ the best back up catcher?

My last blog topic on catcher defense was last November. The trade of Butera has prompted a revisit. Through July 26 while Ryan Doumit was catching, 46 out of zone balls were called strikes and 205 in zone strikes were called balls. They convert it to a ratio which for Doumit would be 0.22 extra strikes/lost strikes. That ratio is the worst in baseball and the next for a current catcher is twice the ratio at 0.44. The data is from Baseball Prospectus. How much difference does that make in terms of runs? Mike Fast used Dan Turkenkopf's study showing that reversing a strike into a ball is worth 0.13 runs. You can and will argue that validity of both but many teams are using this work. Ben Lindbergh had a great series of interviews including executives, catchers, coaches, pitchers and umpires earlier this year. So Doumit had caught 291.2 innings through July 26. He had a net of 159 lost strikes. Converting that into runs and using a per 9 inning measure, Doumit has impacted the game by 0.64 runs per 9 innings this year. Many of you will join the Twins in ignoring this data. Shouldn't the Twins wonder why the Dodgers with a back up catcher with an OPS of .590 didn't go after Doumit? Instead, they added Butera. Butera can't hit. He can catch. Through 2012 had been about even in the strike/ball counts. He is very good in other measures and may be very good in receiving the ball. Earlier this year Ramon Hernandez was the Dodgers back up catcher with an OPS over .700. They dropped Hernandez for the more skilled receiver in Federowicz. Federowicz can't match Hernandez' hitting. He can catch. Look for quotes from Steve Yeager in the top article below about the Dodgers and catcher defense. Do you want the Twins to continue to ignore this data from pitch f/x? Could it be that the Rays, Yankees, Dodgers, Pirates and Diamondbacks are off base in seeking catchers for their ability to receive the ball? How much does Doumit cost the team with his defense? It must be something, but 0.64 seems very high. Even if it is half that, is it possible that we have been employing the wrong back up catcher this year? My sources http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9275754/studying-art-pitch-framing-catchers-such-francisco-cervelli-chris-stewart-jose-molina-others http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=21363 http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=15093 http://subjspeak.blogspot.com/2012/12/catcher-framing-part-1.html Edit: to add offensive comparison. Doumit has created 40 runs this year (Baseball Reference) in 372 plate appearances. That is 0.43 runs per 4 plate appearances. Last year, Butera created 8 runs in 122 plate appearances or 0.26 per game. The difference in the offense while playing Doumit is about 0.17. Could Butera have made up that difference with his defense at catcher? The Twins probably expected Doumit to do as well as last year's 0.51 per 4 PA. That is 0.25 runs per 4 PA better than they might have expected from Butera. Did the Twins employ the best back up catcher?

I have no idea why they kept him this year. Their value of defense at catcher was made clear with their signing and extending of Doumit.

Must be nice to going to an organization that understands and values defense at catcher. Good luck Drew. Our pitchers will miss you.