A common thought among baseball fans like... "Since there are a larger number of starting pitchers on the free agent market, it is good for my team because we need pitching" I would like to challenge that argument. I do believe a larger market can be an advantage for some teams. I don't believe that a larger market can be good for every team that needs pitching. Many teams need pitching. If the market is an advantage for some, doesn't it need to be a disadvantage for others? In a large mar
Sample sizes for a few ratios are becoming large enough to consider. For pitchers, strike out rate stabilizes at 70 batters faced and ground ball and fly ball rate stabilizes at 70 balls in play. By stabilizing, that doesn’t necessarily mean it is the new expected rate. It does mean that any significant changes from previous year cannot be written off to small sample size. For minor leaguers a drop or change likely coincides with a step up in classification and the necessary adjustment. It is al
How do the Twins perform on the corners compared to other team in the AL Central? Previous: Up the Middle First Base (ranked by wRC+) Tigers (1st) 176 Sox (2nd) 129 Royals (8th) 118 Indians(10th) 110 Twins (11th) 98 Cabrera is a monster. Abreau is very good. Santana will be better. I think Mauer can close the gap and approach Hosmer’s production in the second half. It is hard to imagine the Twins climbing out of fifth at 1B though. They really need Mauer to be a league ave
Signing relievers to multi-year free agent deals is a risky proposition. Dave Cameron had these numbers in a study from 2010. I wondered if anything had changed since the study and the new free agency rules. There were 11 non-closer relievers signed prior to the 2013 season to multi year deals. Jeremy Affeldt (2013-2015), 3 years, $18 million: $-6.6 million(Fangraphs) Mike Adams (2013-2014), 2 years, $12 million: $0.1 million(Fangraphs) Jason Grilli (2013-2014), 2 years, $6.75 million: $1
Terry Ryan has had success finding bargains in winter free agency. Kurt Suzuki was an all star. Jared Burton was a top set up man. Ryan Doumit provided a very good bat. In all three cases, the Twins chose to extend into their thirties rather than sell. It is not possible to know what the offers could have been for those players. They were all performing well enough to be valued by other teams and there would have been offers. All three could point to some aspect of their games or health that had
With the depth of the Twins system, they will have several players that need to be put on the 40 man roster this winter to avoid the rule 5 draft. Are there so many that the Twins should consider trading some of them this summer? How many spots will reasonably be available this winter? With the DFA of Tim Stauffer, the Twins currently have 40 men on their 40 man roster. There is one spot available as Ervin Santana will not count until he return in July. The Twins will have some players ente
How does the Twins performance up the middle compare to the other teams of the AL Central? With the help of fangraphs, here is how the AL Central teams performed up the middle. Catcher (Ranked by wRC+) Tigers (4th) 100 Royals (7th) 87 Indians (8th) 86 White Sox (9th) 80 Twins (13th) 56 For fear of long discussion about WAR, I will leave it out. For the other positions, I will put some defensive rankings. We could start a thread and argue about catcher defense and framing also. I will state
The Twins have drafted more often that any other team in this slot. This will be the 7th time in 54 drafts. Three guys are among the top pick 20s according to WAR in Torii Hunter, Denard Span and Trevor Plouffe. One other pick was helpful though he never played in the majors. Johnny Ard twice made BA's top 100 and was traded to the Giants prior to the 1991 championship season for reliever Steve Bedrosian. Ard's career ended with arm injuries in the Giants system. Mike Mussina posts the best
I really hold back what I would like to say about then payroll arguments here. The fact that people don't accept the amount taken in dictates the amount going out requires one of two things. Extreme financial ignorance or fanatical bias that prevents the acceptance of something some basic. I did not change the argument. It's the same idiocy over and over. Do you really want to be on the side that suggests revenues does not determine spending capacity?
At this point in the pre-season, I’m just so happy to be seeing games again, I don’t care about the Twins record in 2023. I think they’ll win it all, unrealistically speaking 🙂
I really hold back what I would like to say about then payroll arguments here. The fact that people don't accept the amount taken in dictates the amount going out requires one of two things. Extreme financial ignorance or fanatical bias that prevents the acceptance of something some basic. I did not change the argument. It's the same idiocy over and over. Do you really want to be on the side that suggests revenues does not determine spending capacity?· 0 replies
