Sorry...Buxton is a flop

[FunnyPenguin]

Time to discuss Buxton, he has a terrible track record of injuries and while all the scouts have great things in view for him, he's never really broke out.  My prediction is that he will just be around league average at the plate but stellar in the field. What do you think?  Even with that he will be an asset but not the "Mike Trout" level of hype he's been surrounded with his whole career.

[gunnarthor]

He'll be a multiple all-star.  He's very, very good.  I think people have a little prospect fatigue with him and fail to understand how impressive his season was last year.  He'll be fine.  Keep in mind, he's actually had fewer milb PA than Trout did.  

[twinsnorth49]

He's 22 dude, carry on with your prediction however. Suffice it to say I think he'll be far better than what you suggest.

[Pardon My Dinger]

Buck's got me nervous, but I'm just going to hold that in, lest I should look like a real jerk when he breaks out. All I'm going to say is "league average at the plate but stellar in the field" is not quite what I would consider a 'flop.'

[IowaTwin346]

He  has 153 MLB at bats. 153! Not everyone clicks right away. Ideally he would have not come up last year when he did. Yes, maybe the Trout comparisons were maybe overdone, but that is what happens, they have to be compared to someone.

He has been good although inconsistent in the minors but the struggles there all coincided with injuries.

[FunnyPenguin]

 

Buck's got me nervous, but I'm just going to hold that in, lest I should look like a real jerk when he breaks out. All I'm going to say is "league average at the plate but stellar in the field" is not quite what I would consider a 'flop.'

Yes you are right, not a flop but just not what he has been hyped to.

[TheLeviathan]

I think he'll be a very good player, but I think he's going to need some time in AAA first.

[Mike Sixel]

I think he'll be in AAA for a couple months this year, then back up, and much better.

[Loosey]

 

Time to discuss Buxton, he has a terrible track record of injuries and while all the scouts have great things in view for him, he's never really broke out.  My prediction is that he will just be around league average at the plate but stellar in the field. What do you think?  Even with that he will be an asset but not the "Mike Trout" level of hype he's been surrounded with his whole career.

He's basically had less than 2 full years of Minor League ball under his belt due to injuries and early call-ups.  276 minor league games.  Compare that to Andrew McCutcheon.  He played 511 minor league games first. Basically double that of Buxton.  McCutcheon is more who I would compare him to instead of Trout.  Trout is a generational type of player, McCutcheon is an MVP/All-Star.  I'll take that too.

 

He will be fine in time.  Send him to AAA let him get some confidence and then bring him back up.  I wish they could send the whole team AAA for a confidence boost, but Buxton will do. 

[Aggies7]

The organization ruined him by bringing him up way too soon. And keeping him up.

[bluechipper]

The organization ruined him by bringing him up way too soon. And keeping him up.

If playing someone in the MLB instead of a little more time at AA/AAA ruins him, then that player was probably never going to be that good anyway.

[Sam Morley]

Do people think he looks better this season than last last season, or the same, at the plate? I think he's looked much better. Last season, the way he looked at the plate- I've never seen anything like it. He wasn't even close. It was breaking ball over for a called strike, breaking ball over for called strike two, and then breaking ball off the plate for swinging strike three- every single time. Very weird, and you could never pitch like that to a professional hitter. I'm sure no-one pitched to him that way in the minors. I'm sure in the minors, he was pitched to with a typical approach, and probably even with some added respect. He was surely used to being more selective; used to seeing more fastballs early in the count, and more balls off the plate early in the count. Watching him last season, it was like he couldn't believe they were pitching him the way they were, like he was waiting for things to get normal. It was surprising that he was never able to adjust, that he never started going after those breaking balls over early, and that it was so easy to get him to chase when he was behind.

 

This season, I would say things are looking more normal. He seems more prepared, and the at-bats seem more balanced. In the game with the two doubles he smoked, I thought things were looking really good.

 

Obviously, looking at the batting average, the results are not demonstrative of the improved approach. But given the batting avgs of the rest of the lineup minus Mauer and Escobar, I don't know how to differentiate his failures at the plate from anyone else's. I mean, they all look terrible at times, and have had some bad luck- that opening game against KC, we had like four dingers get blown back in, including one by Buck.  

 

Hopefully, we can get David Murphy plugged into this lineup as soon as possible, because that will solve all the problems.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Time to discuss Buxton, he has a terrible track record of injuries and while all the scouts have great things in view for him, he's never really broke out.

He... has... a career... MiLB OPS of... .872...

 

You and I have very different definitions of "really broke out".

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

If playing someone in the MLB instead of a little more time at AA/AAA ruins him, then that player was probably never going to be that good anyway.

Yeah, it's fair to say Buxton should be in Rochester - I was pretty iffy on his promotion out of ST but couldn't truly disagree with it, either - but "ruined" is a pretty ridiculous statement to make after 150 PAs of MLB.

 

Has Buxton been set back by the quick promotion? Maybe. Was it good for his development? Maybe not. But is he ruined? No, if this "ruined" him, he never had much of a shot to be a good MLB player in the first place.

[Aggies7]

 

If playing someone in the MLB instead of a little more time at AA/AAA ruins him, then that player was probably never going to be that good anyway.

It's possible, but if you get off to a horrendous start your growth can be stunted and you may or may not recover. The twins did him a disservice by leaving him up when it was clear he wasn't ready.

[Aggies7]

 

Yeah, it's fair to say Buxton should be in Rochester - I was pretty iffy on his promotion out of ST but couldn't truly disagree with it, either - but "ruined" is a pretty ridiculous statement to make after 150 PAs of MLB.

 

Has Buxton been set back by the quick promotion? Maybe. Was it good for his development? Maybe not. But is he ruined? No, if this "ruined" him, he never had much of a shot to be a good MLB player in the first place.

Maybe I should have said if he turns out to be a bust, then the twins will be to blame for bringing him and leaving him up when he wasn't ready.

[Minniman]

The book is still out, but it was pretty obvious this spring that he was not ready to go.

 

The Twins would have done better to give him time at AAA, and give him more at bats. Buxton isn't ruined, but this season may be.

 

[Michael (ClassicMNTwins)]

 

He'll be a multiple all-star.  He's very, very good.  I think people have a little prospect fatigue with him and fail to understand how impressive his season was last year.  He'll be fine.  Keep in mind, he's actually had fewer milb PA than Trout did.  

Add to that thought this: Torii: 2,273 minor league at bats in parts of 8 (EIGHT) minor league seasons, including 301 at AAA. Finally became a fixture in the Twins outfield during his age 25 season in 2001. Old Mr. Twins here remembers him as a rookie, flailing at breaking pitches-especially that "mystery" delivery his teammates informed him was a "slider."

 

Byron Buxton: 1,069 ABs in four minor league seasons (less than HALF of Torii Hunter's), with a mere 59 at AAA last year when he was 21. I repeat...he was 21 years old. I note a fairly recent  tendency among MLB fans, as teams seem to shoot prospects through their systems to the majors more quickly, and now people are pushing  the panic button with young Mr. Buck, it's okay, this isn't the NFL with immediate rookie payoffs, especially at the "skill" positions. Baseball players, I think it can be stated, have a much more difficult skill set to master than do NBA and NFL guys. Torii is just one of thousands of examples of people who have needed more time to develop. We can wait for talent like this in baseball...

[Mr. Brooks]

Wow.

I should stop being amazed at the goldfish level of attention spans kids these days have, but somehow, I still am.

21 years old and 153 mlb ab's erases all his tools and tearing up every level of milb despite being one of the youngest at every level?

And his injuries have almost all been of the fluke variety. I wouldn't worry about that just yet.

[Mike Sixel]

 

Add to that thought this: Torii: 2,273 minor league at bats in parts of 8 (EIGHT) minor league seasons, including 301 at AAA. Finally became a fixture in the Twins outfield during his age 25 season in 2001. Old Mr. Twins here remembers him as a rookie, flailing at breaking pitches-especially that "mystery" delivery his teammates informed him was a "slider."

 

Byron Buxton: 1,069 ABs in four minor league seasons (less than HALF of Torii Hunter's), with a mere 59 at AAA last year when he was 21. I repeat...he was 21 years old. I note a fairly recent  tendency among MLB fans, as teams seem to shoot prospects through their systems to the majors more quickly, and now people are pushing  the panic button with young Mr. Buck, it's okay, this isn't the NFL with immediate rookie payoffs, especially at the "skill" positions. Baseball players, I think it can be stated, have a much more difficult skill set to master than do NBA and NFL guys. Torii is just one of thousands of examples of people who have needed more time to develop. We can wait for talent like this in baseball...

 

the world is a different place. Baseball is much more the game of the young. Look around the league, "prime" is dropping, and starting ages are dropping.

 

Buxton was/is the #1 prospect in all of baseball, not some random prospect. There should be high expectations for that kind of player, imo.

[Linus]

3 years ago he was hitting crappy high school pitching in rural Georgia. That he is even in the bigs an accomplishment especially with missed time for injuries.

[jimmer]

 

 

Buxton was/is the #1 prospect in all of baseball, not some random prospect. There should be high expectations for that kind of player, imo.

Yeah, not sure why it's such an issue to expect a top 2 prospect the last 3 years to be good enough to at least be a serviceable player.  Comparing him to average prospects as a way to minimize the disappointing performance doesn't make sense.

 

Being a very top kind of prospect naturally deserves higher expectations.  Can't brag about how great of a prospect he is for years and then say, well lots of guy struggle.  Not lots of guy were top 2 prospects in the game.

 

Right now, just being a serviceable player would be fine, with hopeful greatness coming later.  He's not close (other than defensively)

[ShouldaCouldaWoulda]

Look, the odds of us making the playoffs this year were in all reality pretty unlikely, regardless of what the homers thought based on last year. This 0-9 hole only makes it that much more unlikely we will be playing meaningful games in September. 

 

Buxton clearly has athletic skills, but just looks sloppy and unrefined to me. He needs more plate appearances to work things out. Our lineup is already flawed, so I suggest batting him 1st or send him down to bat 1st. This will get him more plate appearances and experience to work on things. He will also likely see a starter 1 more time a game, and a nasty reliever 1 less time a game, which would help him as well. Just like batting Russell 9th last year did his development and stats no favor for those some reasons. This is a bad team, so who cares if he fails in the 9th spot or first spot...at least he will get more practice.

[ShouldaCouldaWoulda]

...Also read a comment in a chat today that suggested that the guy questioned Buxton would get the instruction he needed in our organization due to the Twins history of failing to improve guys with his type of skill set. Thought that was interesting.

[alarp33]

 

Yeah, not sure why it's such an issue to expect a top 2 prospect the last 3 years to be good enough to at least be a serviceable player.  Comparing him to average prospects as a way to minimize the disappointing performance doesn't make sense.

 

Being a very top kind of prospect naturally deserves higher expectations.  Can't brag about how great of a prospect he is for years and then say, well lots of guy struggle.  Not lots of guy were top 2 prospects in the game.

 

Right now, just being a serviceable player would be fine, with hopeful greatness coming later.  He's not close (other than defensively)

 

Yeah, not sure why its an issue to wait more than 150 at bats to judge a 22 year old.  
Comparing him to avg prospects is no more absurd than expecting him to hit immediately, especially considering his background and age

 

BTW, defense is part of the game. He is a serviceable "player" because he is one of the best center fielders in baseball

[jimmer]

 

Yeah, not sure why its an issue to wait more than 150 at bats to judge a 22 year old.  

 

BTW, defense is part of the game. He is a serviceable "player" because he is one of the best center fielders in baseball

It's not an issue necessarily, but he doesn't look close.  And, to be honest, saying he's one of the best centerfielders in the game could be a stretch at this point as well, no.  I mean if you can't judge a guy on 150 ABs, certainly you also can't judge a guy's defense in such a small sample size too right?  It works both ways.  He's done well, for sure, but there are a lot of quality defensive CFs.

[tobi0040]

The issue with calling Buxton a flop is that his bat doesn't need to be near all star level for him to be a 2-3 WAR player. His defense and speed, along with a .250 average probably brings him there

[alarp33]

 

It's not an issue necessarily, but he doesn't look close.  And, to be honest, saying he's one of the best centerfielders in the game could be a stretch at this point as well, no.  I mean if you can't judge a guy on 150 ABs, certainly you also can't judge a guy's defense in such a small sample size too right?  It works both ways.

 

I'm judging both (too early, but thats the theme of this thread). He's been very bad at the plate, and phenomenal in CF. He's serviceable due to the latter

[Mike Sixel]

 

Yeah, not sure why its an issue to wait more than 150 at bats to judge a 22 year old.  
Comparing him to avg prospects is no more absurd than expecting him to hit immediately, especially considering his background and age

 

BTW, defense is part of the game. He is a serviceable "player" because he is one of the best center fielders in baseball

 

I won't speak for jimmer, but I'm not judging him.....I'm asking why we should set our expectations LOW for one of the top prospects in all the game. He's not a random prospect. 

[jimmer]

 

I'm judging both (too early, but thats the theme of this thread). He's been very bad at the plate, and phenomenal in CF. He's serviceable due to the latter

honestly, I think phenomenal is stretching it to find a silver lining.  He's been good, and he could end up being phenomenal.  He's made 16 plays this year, that's it.