Matthew Trueblood

The Twins have set themselves some difficult constraints for offseason shopping, but they still need to make additions. Looking at the things the team does well and the things they look for in pitchers of whom they can make projects, we can try to identify some viable targets on the free-agent starting pitching market, given various payroll possibilities. Image courtesy of © Scott Taetsch-USA TODAY Sports Though they've made the occasional attempt to do so, the Derek Falvey and Thad Levine-led Twins have yet to pay full freight for an established starting pitcher via free agency. The price at which they're comfortable never seems to match up with the one guys like that eventually command. Instead, in addition to the higher-level arms they've successfully targeted in trades, the front office has tried to find free agents who give them a backstop in the last two slots in their rotation. Those guys tend to have warts of various kinds, and the team's success in removing those warts has been mixed, but the idea is to find value by accepting risk. When they go looking for those kinds of pitchers, the team still sticks to its broad preferences in terms of pitch mix and profile. In February, I wrote about a new way to think about and classify pitch types, using the lateral direction of their movement. The Twins, I noted then, heavily prefer pitches that mostly work vertically and have little horizontal movement: four-seamers, curveballs, and splitters. In 2022, they were much less likely than most other teams to use Armside offerings (sinkers and traditional changeups) or Gloveside ones (sliders, sweepers, and cutters). We can update that a bit. The Twins have gotten, if anything, even more of a leader in emphasizing vertical offerings. Only the Astros used four-seamers, splitters, and curves on a higher percentage of their pitches than did the Twins last year. They also remain extreme in their distaste for sinkers and standard-issue changeups, with only two teams using those less often. However, they've made a small move toward the middle of the pack in the frequency with which they use Gloveside stuff. Here's the breakdown, for the last two years. You can see the subtle shift, which mirrors the league-wide trends. Season Armside Vertical Gloveside 2022 18.8 57.6 23.1 2023 19.4 54.3 26.1 It certainly isn't as though the Twins hate the slider, sweeper or cutter. As we know, their work to develop one for Pablo López was a key to his ace-level breakout in 2023. Nor do their preferences in this respect guide every single acquisition. They also have some things they like mechanically, and in terms of athleticism, and even if a pitcher doesn't yet check their boxes in terms of pitch mix, they know they can sometimes add or tweak an offering. These preferences can guide decisions about whom to target, but also about what to do once a player is acquired. Let's talk about who the team could focus on in free agency this winter, even given their payroll limitations, while keeping their organizational predilections in mind. View full article

If you don’t look closely enough, you’ll miss it. The differences between Sonny Gray’s 2022 and 2023 seasons are so subtle that you could fool yourself into thinking he’s the same guy, only healthier. It ain’t so. Image courtesy of © Matt Blewett-USA TODAY Sports Last December, I wrote about Sonny Gray and the Twins’ persistent problem with seizing the platoon advantage on the mound. We discussed the two distinct pitchers living within Gray, because every pitcher needs to have a bifurcated approach with which they can succeed against two very different opponents: left- and right-handed batters. At the time, as I wrote, he was largely a two-pitch pitcher against lefties, and only a little more than that against righties. He worked, mostly, north and south, and he got plenty of strikeouts but was somewhat vulnerable to power. By now, everyone has heard about Gray’s embrace of the sweeper, which is the same pitch that has transmogrified Pablo Lopez into an ace. Last week, our Parker Hageman delivered a deep dive on Lopez, with heavy emphasis on that sweeper and its unique utility. As Parker shared, Lopez’s breakthrough came when the Twins helped him understand that throwing a good sweeper doesn’t require the same hand or wrist action–the same manipulation of the baseball–as a typical slider. Much of the magic of the sweeper lies in the confluence of grip and arm angle. That allows a pitcher to add it to their suite of breaking balls without cannibalizing the rest of the set, as often happened in the past when a hurler who specialized in either the curve or the slider tried to mix in the other. After a year of tinkering and blending it in with his former, truer slider, Gray has made the full conversion to the sweeper in 2023. It’s been a smashing success. Gray has achieved: A swing rate of 54.3 percent on sweepers (7th-best of 98 pitchers who have thrown at least 200 sweepers) A Whiff rate (as a percentage of swings) of 41.8 percent (19th) A Called Strike Probability (an estimate of a pitcher’s tendency to be around the zone with a pitch, expressed as the chances that an average pitch in the sample would be called a strike if the batter doesn’t swing) of 30 percent (97th on the aforementioned list of 98) He’s getting a lot of chases on the offering, and many of those swings are coming up empty. The sweeper has been a lethal weapon for Gray. Note that hitters are waving at it often, despite the fact that it’s rarely even especially close to the strike zone by the time it arrives at home plate. That doesn’t make sense. Usually, especially with a breaking ball, a pitcher has to establish both an ability and a willingness to land the ball in the strike zone, to induce hitters to take the bat off their shoulders. Gray isn’t around the zone with the sweeper very much at all, but he’s getting an above-average swing rate against it, anyway. How? Unfortunately, the deep-dive into this topic is for Caretakers only. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and Caretakers support them. So if you're a Caretaker, just scroll down. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? There are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. View full article

The Twins strike out, walk, and hit home runs. It's mostly worked for them thus far. Image courtesy of © Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports Infamously, Twins batters not only struck out more than any other team in MLB this season, but set the all-time record in that category. We live in the age of the strikeout, but even within it, this season has marked a foray into uncharted terrain. The Twins struck out in over 26.5 percent of their plate appearances this year. Yet, they’ve also hit the third-most homers in baseball, and drawn the fourth-most walks. They’re an extreme three-true-outcomes offense, even without Joey Gallo in the mix. They have a consciously constructed team approach, and they stick to it throughout an at-bat. It’s why they strike out so much, but it might also be why they’re a good overall lineup. Over the 35 years for which we have pitch-by-pitch records of all MLB games, the frequency with which plate appearances reach two-strike counts has risen steadily. The rate of change isn’t quite identical, but the rate at which hitters strike out once the count reaches that state has risen, too. At this point, over 53 percent of plate appearances reach a two-strike count, and once that happens, the odds of a strikeout are around 42 percent. It’s good to understand these base rates, because they illustrate how the game has changed even further under the surface than we realize. It seems obvious to say that a league that sees more strikeouts also sees many more strikes, but without taking a moment to meditate on that and to check the assumption, we might miss it, and the implications of it. Why is hitting so much harder than it used to be? In some major part, it’s because pitchers throw a lot of strikes and put hitters in bad situations. Then, they have better putaway stuff once they have the batter cornered. Unfortunately, the deep-dive into this topic is for Caretakers only. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and Caretakers support them. So if you're a Caretaker, just scroll down. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? There are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. View full article

Let's quit playing checkers and start playing chess with the Twins' October catching opportunities. Image courtesy of © Benny Sieu-USA TODAY Sports Over the last few months, the Twins have quietly undertaken a unique experiment in catcher usage. In the last few weeks, it’s taken a truly historic turn. Christian Vázquez and Ryan Jeffers have exactly alternated starts behind the plate for the last 23 games (as of Sept. 19). One starts one game, and the other starts the next. It’s as rigid (yet creative) a division of the labor of the men behind the plate as any team has attempted in recent memory, but it invites the question: How will the catchers be deployed come the playoffs? Of course, that window–”the playoffs”--could turn out to be a grandiose term for as little as two games of real baseball. We all hope, though, that this will be the year when the Twins have to manage something much more lasting and complicated than that. If it does, how will the team decide when to start which catcher? During the long grind of an MLB regular season, alternating backstops makes a world of sense. It keeps both men fresh, and that objective is at least as worthy as squeezing out a potential run prevented (or scored) here or there. In the postseason, that’s no longer a primary decision driver. Even small margins are worth fighting over in October, and everyone stays fresh enough, anyway, thanks to the off days baked into the postseason schedule. Happily, the Twins don’t have to lurch around blindfolded here. Their two catchers are both good receivers and game-callers, but they do things slightly differently, and that can help inform the pairings the team should pursue when the stakes are high. After all, the catcher is only half the battery on a given night, and the way their skills as framers and game-callers align with those of the pitchers with whom they work is important information. Vázquez is the superior pitch framer between these two, overall. He’s also slightly better at controlling the running game. The latter only becomes important if runners start populating the bases, though, and the nobler purpose of a good catcher is to prevent that from happening in the first place. Let’s start, then, by being more specific about what each man does well as a framer. Thanks to the data collected via Statcast and released to the public via Baseball Savant, we can see that Vázquez isn’t fractionally better than Jeffers at framing all pitches. Instead, he’s considerably better when catching balls on the right side of home plate (from the catcher’s perspective; that makes it the backhand side for right-handed catchers, reaching across with their mitts) and along the bottom edge of the zone. Jeffers is better, however, to the left side of the plate, and especially along the top edge of the zone, as can be seen in the graphic below. This article continues with a deeper dive into the nuances the Twins will consider for October starts, but it is exclusively for Twins Daily caretakers. To become a Caretaker and read the rest of the piece, you can subscribe here. You'll support the writers that provide you free Twins stories and analysis everyday, both in-season and offseason. View full article

His legs are disloyal, and his arm isn’t what it used to be. Once the tip of the spear as the Twins thrust back from rebuilding to contention, he’s now on his third position and his ninth life. He’s had to completely reinvent himself at the plate over the last two seasons. Yet, he’s as good as ever. This is not the fall of Jorge Polanco. Instead, this October might just be The Fall of Jorge Polanco. Image courtesy of © Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports In his prime, Jorge Polanco was an athletic enough shortstop whose only serious deficiency was his throwing arm. That carried over to his work in the batter’s box, too. Polanco used to run pretty well, and it was an important part of his game. From 2017-21, Polanco averaged 17 infield hits and four more via bunt per season–and those averages were pulled down by the truncated season in 2020. Because of those skills, he developed an approach focused on hitting line drives, and on making contact. That aspect of his game is gone. Polanco’s average Sprint Speed, according to Statcast, has dropped from well above-average to slightly below, and the capacity he used to have for hitting an extra gear when he smelled a hit is kaput. He has just 13 infield hits on swings and two via bunt since the start of 2022, and he last had a competitive run in which he reached the elite speed threshold set by Baseball Savant early last season. It’s normal for this to happen, but Polanco resisted the trend at first. Then, he was pulled with unusual suddenness down into the mud where older players run, because of the ankle injury he battled for years. Now, he deals with semi-chronic ankle, knee, and hamstring trouble, and speed just isn’t a significant asset for him. The slower, balkier legs are the result of injuries, but Polanco has also had to contend with slightly slowing hands and eyes, for which the only blame we can assign goes to the frailty of the human condition. He’s only 30, but 30 is the new 35 in MLB, and that whip-quick, line-drive swing with the high contact rate is fading into memory, from both sides of the plate. That’s the bad news. The good news is that, with a high baseball IQ and a work ethic that matches it, Polanco has reimagined himself at the plate. He needed a swing adjustment and an approach adjustment, and because he’s a switch-hitter, that really meant he needed two swing adjustments and two approach adjustments. However many that adds up to, he made all of them. Despite lingering injury trouble, he’s boosted himself to a batting line of .260/.342/.467 this year. If he’s producing any worse than he did at his peak a few years ago, it’s only by a bit. He’s radically reshaped his production, but not lost it. Let’s talk about how. You rarely see the data presented this way, but I think it’s important to do so. Let’s break Polanco up into the two hitters who really live within him, one from each side of the plate. First, here are some key statistics for him as a right-handed batter (facing lefty pitchers), from 2019 through last week. This article continues with a deeper dive of how Polanco has become a very different player, but it is exclusively for Twins Daily caretakers. To become a Caretaker and read the rest of the piece, you can subscribe here. You'll support the writers that provide you free Twins stories and analysis every day, both in-season and offseason. View full article

Unfortunately, it’s only fair to point out that, right now, Byron Buxton is no more helpful than his longtime teammate. Image courtesy of © Jonathan Hui-USA TODAY Sports For weeks now, Twins fans have clamored for the team to cut ties with Max Kepler. At age 30, and with only a team option remaining on the team-friendly extension he signed several years ago, Kepler is expendable. Fans are right not to consider him valuable, at the moment. Unfortunately, it’s only fair to point out that Byron Buxton is no more helpful than his longtime teammate. If this seems melodramatic, it’s only because Buxton’s hot streaks can be so volcanic that they disguise the true depths to which he plunges during cold streaks. In his first four games back from the injured list, he’s 0-16, with ten strikeouts. Lest you think it’s just rust that needs shaking off, though, Buxton is hitting just .149/.289/.267 since May 1. The culprit for these long struggles is related to the fact that he was playing through chronic injury, even before being sidelined due to his ribs, but that doesn’t mean that it will magically be ameliorated, even by time and rest. No, the problem here is that Buxton is genuinely becoming a right-handed analog of Kepler. Since the start of 2022, he has a .248 batting average on balls in play. This is the statistic that best captures what makes Kepler tantalizing and maddening. For years, fans have (incorrectly) expected Kepler’s BABIP to stabilize and regress toward the league’s average figure, near .300, but Kepler’s approach and his swing path don’t lend themselves to the skill that is BABIP. He runs extremely low numbers in that category not due to bad luck or defensive alignments, but because of the way he swings and the pitches at which he chooses to do so. The very same set of choices underpin Buxton’s game, at this point in his career. He’s a dead-pull, fly ball hitter, but more importantly, he’s a hitter focused on making contact far in front of home plate. He’s not merely quick to the ball in a way that naturally leads to pulling it; he’s built a swing designed to intercept the ball after the bat has passed the point of being parallel with the front of home plate, and well before the ball actually gets to the plate. You can see it when looking at his swings in some key situations. Unfortunately, the video breakdowns are for Caretakers only. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and they support them. So if you're a Caretaker, just scroll down. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? There are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. View full article

The Twins' key tendency since 2019 is misfiring. Image courtesy of © Nick Turchiaro-USA TODAY Sports Recently, we paused around the two-month marker of the season to check in on some trends we identified as important ones before the campaign began. That first installment focused on the pitchers. Today, let’s talk about how the Twins’ position players are doing, and about how the front office is deploying them, both to score runs and to support the pitchers in their effort to prevent them. The Offense is Misfiring, But Not Dead As terrific as the pitching staff has been over the first two months, the offense has been brutally disappointing. Back in November, I wrote about the all-costs emphasis the team places on pulling the ball in the air, with some degree of power. From 2019-22, no team in baseball had a higher Bomba Rate–the name I’ve given to the percentage of plate appearances ending with a batted ball to the batter’s pull field, with an exit velocity of 88 miles per hour or greater and a launch angle between 10 and 40 degrees. They’re down to 10th in that department in 2023, at 7.2 percent. In other words, they’re driving the ball in the specific way that most reliably leads to extra-base hits less often (in both absolute and relative terms) than they have since before Rocco Baldelli took over as manager. Part of the reason for their inability to pull away in this lousy division is, without question, their faltering power production. There's more to cover, including some notes on the Twins' defensive positioning under the new shift rules, but it's for Caretakers only. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and they support them. So if you're a Caretaker, just scroll down. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? There are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. View full article

A deeper dive into the some offseason adjustments shows some results. Image courtesy of © Bruce Kluckhohn-USA TODAY Sports It’s not a pure coincidence that Memorial Day is the point at which longtime baseball watchers first try to take serious stock of things. It roughly marks the one-third point of the season. It used to come about two weeks before the June 15 trading deadline, making it imperative that teams know what they had and what they needed by then. The latter is no longer true, but it’s still a great time to check in on the key trends within the bigger-picture performance for the first-place Twins. Over the winter, I wrote about a few of the things that most urgently informed the Twins’ offseason moves and adjustments–matters of player selection, but also deployment and approach. Let’s discuss a few of those areas, and see how the team has done in addressing them thus far in 2023–starting with the pitching side of things. Getting More Advantage from the Platoon Advantage As I wrote in December, the Twins had a major problem with leveraging the platoon advantage last season. It was rooted in their predilections for certain pitch types, and in the types of pitchers they preferred. This winter, they only turned over a small share of the pitching staff, even if one of those moves (the trade for Pablo Lopez) was a pretty huge one. Yet, they’ve achieved a major turnaround. This season, the Twins enjoy the platoon advantage more often than any other pitching staff in MLB, at 55 percent of the time. Last year, though, that wouldn’t have actually netted them much of an edge, because they so often struggled against same-handed batters. Things have changed. Minnesota Twins, 2023 Platoon Splits Split PA AVG OBP SLG MLB Rank RHP v RHB 1015 .230 .285 .376 6th RHP v LHB 794 .229 .304 .368 3rd LHP v RHB 97 .226 .305 .405 7th LHP v LHB 71 .148 .254 .164 1st Obviously, it helps to be a really good pitching staff, overall. Still, rather than being average (or worse) when they have the platoon matchup in their favor, the Twins are now one of the best teams in baseball in those situations. That marks a major improvement, and makes the fact that they’ve been able to get so many favorable matchups even more valuable. There's more to cover, including a trend that Joe Ryan has embraced, but it's for Caretakers only. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and they support them. So if you're a Caretaker, just scroll down. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? There are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. View full article

The changes that inspired the Twins to extend Pablo López for four years and $73.5 million have been well-documented. He’s added a new pitch, and increased his velocity. There’s further evolution and some vital consolidation of skills and ideas left ahead, though. Let’s explore. Few pitchers in baseball are more intelligent and eloquent than Pablo Lopez, so maybe the right way to talk about these changes is in terms of Bloom’s Taxonomy. You probably learned about this way back in elementary school. Bloom’s Taxonomy is a framework for learning in which learning progresses through stages, with each stage building upon mastery of the previous one. You can see it above. It’s meant as a broad concept, but in certain cases, it can be neatly applied to specific endeavors. In the highly intentional, craftsmanlike career of a pitcher like López, the art and science of pitching maps right onto this pyramid. López doesn’t have overwhelming raw stuff, and while he’s always been regarded as a promising player, he didn’t arrive in the majors as anything close to a fully formed ace. He’s had to make stepwise progressions. By the time the Twins acquired him, López had already moved through a few of those stages. That’s why he’s now approaching ace status. He’s not only adding pitches, but integrating them in a logically consistent way into his overall arsenal. Simultaneously, he’s improving his mechanics, so that each pitch he throws is more effective in an absolute sense, as well as in relation to one another. He’s identified his basic flaws and weaknesses, and taken all the plausible steps to remediate them. He’s past merely recognizing patterns and options, and has reached the point of comparing and evaluating them, the better to bring the best ones together as a coherent, whole approach. Famously, López is a part of Sweeper Mania. Every pitcher who has ever thrown a breaking ball has tried to develop a sweeping slider this spring. Somewhere in the wilds of the American South, far from your televisions but always just beyond the range of your mind’s eye, Bert Blyleven has abandoned his hopelessly old-fashipned curveball and is pondering a comeback using a sweeper. It’s an unfortunate side effect of the particular, technology- and management-driven evolution of the game that every innovation anyone has tried recently seems to have immediately been tried by about 40 others. It takes some of the romance and the mystery out of pitch development, which should be an iterative, pedagogical, individualized process–not an assembly line thing. Still and all, López is one of those guys who would be a good candidate for a sweeping slider, even if pitching coaches didn’t suddenly see everyone as a good candidate for a sweeping slider. He throws from a fairly low arm slot, but he’d never had a pitch that moved much to the glove side before adding the sweeper–except his curveball, which was always more of a vertically-shaped offering. There's a lot more - charts, videos, analysis - below for Caretakers. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and they support them. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? There are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. View full article

By now, you’ve heard about the work Tyler Mahle put in this winter to add a sweeping slider to attack right-handed batters with lateral movement. What if I told you, though, that Mahle’s also doing something much less common, and a bit more interesting? Image courtesy of © Rhona Wise-USA TODAY Sports Last spring, Baseball Prospectus’s Michael Ajeto wrote about the fact that Tyler Mahle was trying one of the trickier (but niftier) things a pitcher can do to counteract a platoon-split problem: working from different spots on the pitching rubber according to the handedness of his opponent. By May, Mahle abandoned the effort. Guess what, though? He’s back at it. We’re not talking about a difference of a few inches, but a little over a foot. Against lefties, Mahle is setting up at an extreme angle, with only the front half of his right foot touching the rubber at the first-base end. Against righties, he’s right in the middle of the rubber. If you're a Caretaker, just scroll down to find out why the change. We need to reserve this deep-dive content for Caretakers because these types of stories cost more to produce, and they support them. If you're not, maybe consider becoming a Caretaker? You likely visit regularly, and that's going to become even more likely as the season gears up. Supporting something you value feels good, especially when it's been here feeding your baseball habit for over 10 years for free, right? Plus, there are lots of other benefits, like a free Winter Meltdown ticket and early access for guests, special callouts on the site, and lots more inside or in-depth content like this. So please consider joining our little club. The money is going to a site you love, to support coverage you love, and writers you value. Thank you so much. Join Here to support Twins Daily and get your exclusive content! View full article

The Twins' new school pitching philosophy looks an awful lot like an old school philosophy: throw fastballs. Image courtesy of © Ken Blaze-USA TODAY Sports When baseball people break down pitch types into categories, they tend to use three: fastballs, breaking balls, and offspeed pitches. This distinction is decades old, long predating modern, data-centric pitching analysis. It’s a natural one, because it centers on the thing that makes each type of pitch effective: speed, movement, and deception, respectively. There’s another natural way to subdivide pitch types, though. It’s rarely used, but equally valid, and perhaps more in line with the way we think about the craft in the age of biomechanics and high-speed video. You can separate pitches into three broad, slightly messy, but telling categories: Those that move to the “arm side”, or in on a same-handed batter: Sinkers and Changeups Those that move to the “glove side”, away from a same-handed batter: Sliders and Cutters Those that move mostly in the vertical plane, with lateral movement mostly incidental: Four-seam Fastballs, Curveballs, and Splitters There are multiple reasons why the taxonomy of pitching has historically favored the first model. For one thing, it’s neater. There are individual examples of pitches within the familiar categories that actually depend on a characteristic other than the one implied by the name of their category for their effectiveness, but they’re rare. The membranes which divide armside, gloveside, and vertical offerings are much more porous. For another thing, pitching (and pitch types, and especially the tendency to classify pitches that walk near a borderline between two possible ones in certain ways) is always evolving, and until relatively recently, breaking things up according to the direction of movement didn’t fit the way most pitching coaches or public commentators thought about things. Consider the advantages, though. So much about a pitch can be explained by whether it primarily moves to the arm side, the glove side, or vertically. Glove-side movement tends to be hard on same-handed batters, but not opposite-handed ones. Vertical movement creates swings and misses, but isn’t good for managing contact quality or inducing ground balls. Arm-side run is the surest way to generate weak contact, but only misses bats if it comes with some other extraordinary characteristic, and can have wide platoon splits. Separating pitches this way also works because, to create that direction of movement, the pitcher has to do something with their forearm and wrist through delivery. To throw a running sinker or changeup, you have to pronate–turning your forearm and palm out as you release the ball. Sliders and cutters require a pitcher to supinate their wrist, twisting to the inside through release. Four-seamers and splitters, for the most part, depend on staying behind the ball, although in practice, most pitchers pronate slightly when throwing splitters. Curveballs are a special case, requiring a fairly extreme supination, but the relationship between the fastball arm motion and the curveball one is such that most pitchers can feel their way from one to the other. Looking deeper into the Twins pitch selection this way: It's clear the Twins have a preference, and it's not what you think. The Twins' philosophy matches that of other advanced pitching organizations - except in one area. The Twins made at least one offseason move totally counter to their current trend. Looking at one Twins pitcher who struggled last year, it's apparent it doesn't always work, so they're making different choices. We love providing this level of deep-dive coverage, but it's expensive - too expensive to be paid for just by internet ads. So we reserve the rest of this story for the Caretakers that make this kind of coverage possible. If you're a Caretaker, you can find it here. If you read Twins Daily, well, daily, maybe it's time to become a Caretaker. You'll love it. You'll get more meaty stories like this, plus get perks like Winter Meltdown tickets, and other special recognition. And you can join for as little as $4/moth. You can read all about it and signup here. Those benefits are all nice, but the real reason to sign up is this: 100% of all Caretaker money is channeled directly back into the site. By signing up to be a caretaker, you’re supporting writers you value, and enabling deeper dive Twins-specific content like this that isn’t dependent on ad revenue. We hope you’ll consider it. We expect you’ll love the benefits, and we would love to have you take the next step in supporting the Twins Daily community. View full article

The Twins' new school pitching philosophy looks an awful lot like an old school philosophy: throw fastballs. THANK YOU for caretaking Twins Daily. Here's you're exclusive content. When baseball people break down pitch types into categories, they tend to use three: fastballs, breaking balls, and offspeed pitches. This distinction is decades old, long predating modern, data-centric pitching analysis. It’s a natural one, because it centers on the thing that makes each type of pitch effective: speed, movement, and deception, respectively. There’s another natural way to subdivide pitch types, though. It’s rarely used, but equally valid, and perhaps more in line with the way we think about the craft in the age of biomechanics and high-speed video. You can separate pitches into three broad, slightly messy, but telling categories: Those that move to the “arm side”, or in on a same-handed batter: Sinkers and Changeups Those that move to the “glove side”, away from a same-handed batter: Sliders and Cutters Those that move mostly in the vertical plane, with lateral movement mostly incidental: Four-seam Fastballs, Curveballs, and Splitters There are multiple reasons why the taxonomy of pitching has historically favored the first model. For one thing, it’s neater. There are individual examples of pitches within the familiar categories that actually depend on a characteristic other than the one implied by the name of their category for their effectiveness, but they’re rare. The membranes which divide armside, gloveside, and vertical offerings are much more porous. For another thing, pitching (and pitch types, and especially the tendency to classify pitches that walk near a borderline between two possible ones in certain ways) is always evolving, and until relatively recently, breaking things up according to the direction of movement didn’t fit the way most pitching coaches or public commentators thought about things. Consider the advantages, though. So much about a pitch can be explained by whether it primarily moves to the arm side, the glove side, or vertically. Glove-side movement tends to be hard on same-handed batters, but not opposite-handed ones. Vertical movement creates swings and misses, but isn’t good for managing contact quality or inducing ground balls. Arm-side run is the surest way to generate weak contact, but only misses bats if it comes with some other extraordinary characteristic, and can have wide platoon splits. This article continues exclusively for Twins Daily caretakers. To become a caretaker and read the rest of the piece, you can subscribe here. View full article

The Twins' infield's arm strength, even with Carlos Correa, isn't particularly impressive. But their pitching staff gives them a sneaky advantage. Image courtesy of Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports Like the other 29 MLB teams, the Minnesota Twins face a new defensive challenge in 2023: they’ll have to adapt to rules barring shifts on the infield. When we think about the ramifications of that change, we often focus on fielders’ ability to reach and field the ball. In reality, though, there’s an interaction between raw range and throwing arm–one that will become more important. To that end, bringing back Carlos Correa at shortstop was crucial, but even his strong arm faces a tougher test under the new guidelines. Shifts aren’t just about reaching balls that would otherwise scoot cleanly through to the outfield. They are, in nearly equal measure, about making plays more comfortable for defenders. When a big-league team deploys a shift, a much higher share of ground balls hit by the opposition are within a step or two of a fielder’s starting position. They can usually make the play, plant their feet, and make a strong, balanced throw from a firm footing. In a post-shift world, we will see teams carefully calibrate their positioning to create as many of those easy chances as the new constraints permit. Inevitably, though, we’re going to see more plays made on the run. Since two defenders have to set up on each side of second base, the shortstop won’t be able to shade as far toward the hole against some right-handed batters as they previously had, because the second baseman will have to be a couple of steps further away from any ball hit to the left side of second base. That, in turn, will force the third baseman to play a step further off the foul line, in order to help defend the hole. As a result, we’ll see more plays on which a third baseman’s momentum carries him into foul territory as he fields a ground ball up the line. We’ll see more shortstops making plays that require them to give ground and end up in shallow left field, with less time to get off a throw. We’ll see second basemen having to make a few more plays on which they must field the ball on the move away from first base, twist around, and throw off-balance from a position more familiar to the shortstop. These are all tough plays to make, because of a neglected secret of infield play: the time during which the ball is with the fielder is the window in which a groundout can become an infield hit. The ball is usually hit at somewhere north of 70 miles per hour, even on a seemingly slow chopper. Once a fielder grabs it and flings it, it nearly always travels more quickly than that from wherever they are to first base. The length and strength of the throw in question matters, of course, and the speed of the runner matters. Too often, though, we overlook how pivotal the time between a fielder slapping the leather on a grounder and their release can be. To evaluate how well the Twins can handle that in the new era, one must rely on more than velocity, including more nebulous metrics like "arm utility." We dive into that here, along with where the Twins' infielders rank, and the one advantage the rotation might give them. But just using ad revenue, we can't pay writers enough to do that kind of deep dive. So we reserve it for our Caretakers that support it. If you read Twins Daily, well, daily, maybe it's time to become a Caretaker. You're here, um, daily. You like getting deeper into the team. I'm sure you value the site. Plus, you'll love it. You'll get more meaty stories like this, plus get perks like Winter Meltdown tickets, and other special recognition. And you can join for as little as $4/month. You can read all about it and signup here. Those benefits are all nice, but the real reason to sign up is this: 100% of all Caretaker money is channeled directly back into the site. By signing up to be a caretaker, you’re supporting writers you value, and enabling deeper dive Twins-specific content like this that isn’t dependent on ad revenue. We hope you’ll consider it. We expect you’ll love the benefits, and we would love to have you take the next step in supporting the Twins Daily community. View full article