Terry Ryan interview on Fangraphs

[Oxtung]

I found something Terry Ryan said interesting that I had not heard before and I was wondering if this was common knowledge and I am unaware or if any actual analysis had been done on this issue:

 

"...usually when you get strike-throwers, that means they’ve got pretty good mechanics and pretty good deliveries. That usually means they stay healthy."

 

Recently that doesn't seem to be the case. How many of our "strike throwers" have had TJ surgery or just gone on the DL in general? Seems like a bunch. Have we just been unlucky or are other teams even more inflicted?

I unnecessarily muddied my post by including that comment about the recent Twins history. I understand that throwing in general and pitching specifically is an unnatural movement that leads to stresses that arms were just not built for thus leading to a large number of injuries. My real point/question is do "strike throwers" with "pretty good mechanics" actually get hurt less often than "non-strike throwers" or than those with "bad mechanics"? Intuitively the mechanics makes sense. If your throwing motion puts more stress on your arm than is typical then logic says your more likely to injury yourself. However, intuition and "logic" are often times incorrect. For example there has been some recent statistical work done that shows that companies should actually base their promotions not on merit or hiring managers intuition but rather on pure chance. It has been shown that if you randomly promote workers your company will be better off with more appropriate and solid workers at every level. Now that is a pretty counter-intuitive idea. So, getting back to baseball, I'm wondering if there is any work actually corroborating the "better mechanics/strike thrower" with "less injuries" or if this is just a gut feeling. If this is just a gut feeling/intuition how pervasive is this idea? Do more teams than just the Twins believe this?

[Boom Boom]

You're not exactly working the count if you're letting strikes go by you. Both philosophies make sense, and of course, they are counters to one another.

I get what you're saying, but it sounds counterintuitive to teach your pitchers that allowing walks is the worst thing you can do, and then from the other side of your mouth tell your hitters to swing aggressively.

 

If the hitters in the low minors don't have great strike zone command anyway, telling them to "get a pitch and swing" might result in young players swinging at more pitches than they really should be swinging at.

[Paul]

Fantastic interview. Very bright, very ethical man. The Twins are lucky to have him.

 

As to the kerfuffle about not taking stikes...he was talking about the low MINOR leagues. Not the Major league. The goals are different. The goal in the Majors is to win games. The goal in the Minors is to get to the Majors. You want your kids learning how to drive a thrown strike, or at least go get it. They're taught zone recognition as well, but as a separate advanced skill.

[Brock Beauchamp]

If the hitters in the low minors don't have great strike zone command anyway, telling them to "get a pitch and swing" might result in young players swinging at more pitches than they really should be swinging at.

Given how the Twins minor leaguers have done over the past decade, I think it's safe to say that the Twins are no longer breeding hackers at the plate. It's one thing to say "find your pitch and take it" and entirely something else to say "swing like a man".

[Paul]

"It has been shown that if you randomly promote workers your company will be better off with more appropriate and solid workers at every level. Now that is a pretty counter-intuitive idea."

 

Sounds like a bizzare way to offset the Peter Principle.

[CDog]

Hardy was backtracking from his previous comments. You can believe that he was taken out of context the first time, or that he changed his tune because he didn't want to make a public stink about how the Twins coached him like David Ortiz did.

Backtracking or clarifying? His original comments were essentially: In Minnesota, they emphasized going the other way. In Baltimore, they encouraged me to pull more.

 

The second round of comments were essentially: I needed that intermediate step to fix my swing. The Star Trib article that I couldn't copy and paste is a little more clear and emphatic on Hardy's part, and he even said he was quite sure he'd have had a much improved year in Minnesota in '11 compared to '10 (although he qualified that the ballpark itself may have dampened some results).

 

I still don't see how the second round of quotes undoes or backtracks anything from the first. They simply clarified and added context that he seemed to go out of his way to make sure got out there. And again...that seems quite far from animosity to me.

[Top Gun]

Sounds like alot of bs to me.

[chopper0080]

My biggest issue with the Twins hitting has been their approach. The Twins seem to develop hitters who aren't great at working counts to their favor and then making the most of their opportunities. Maybe this is because for a while now, the Twins have never stacked a lineup with solid hitters, top to bottom, like the Yankess. It always frustrates me when our players "miss" mistake pitches and foul them off or hit short fly balls. Even Mauer takes a ton of fastball strikes that I believe he could crush, but he is a good enough hitter to be effective with two strikes and not a lot of hitters are.

[roger]

However, now that the Twins have drafted poorly for 5 + years they don't have the reinforcements to plug in with cost controlled deals.

I see comments like this all the time, yet is it true?

 

2007...Ben Revere taken in the first round is developing into an exciting outfielder and lead off hitter. Rams and Morales second and third haven't panned out. Not a great draft, but it did have a very good one in the first round.

 

2008...Gutierrez should be here by now and Hunt was a disaster. Hicks still has the potential to be special, but is coming along more slowly, somewhat like Hunter did. Hermsen was an excellent pick in the sixth round and Pugh and Tonkin both are intiguing lower round picks. A sub-par to average draft based on how Hicks develops.

 

2009...Gibson projects as a #2 starter who had his development delayed by TJ surgery. Bashore was lost because of injuries. Bullock was used to obtain Scott Diamond. Chris Herrmann remains a solid prospect with Brian Dozier, who is starting for the Twins, having the potential to be a starter for a long time. With Gibson, Diamond, Herrmann and Dozier, certainly above average while losing a first round pick to career ending injury. If Gibson reaches his potential, a very good draft with three starters including Diamond.

 

2010...Certainly to early to tell, however, having Wimmers go down with another injury hurts. But you can't project most injuries. Goodrum, Rosario, and JaDamion Williams were high school picks who we won't know the outcome for years, however, all could be special. Dean and Darnell were both college lefties who are moving up the ladder as expected for guys taken after the first round. Toss in several pitchers, Achter, Gallant and Hauser, and you have a class that could be average or very special should Rosario and Goodrum reach their potential with Wimmers getting healthy.

 

2011...Don't need to say anything more than Boyd and Harrison. Two young kids taken high who are doing very well in their first exposure to professional ball. Add Boer, Williams and Summers and you have three college pitchers who could all make it. Then there is Burris and Malinowski who are two more young kids doing very well out of the chute at ETon. When you take a lot of high school kids you won't know for five or more years what the draft was like. Certainly too early to say this was a poor draft, however.

 

Will any of these classes be above average? 2009, 2010 and 2011 all have a real chance of being very good. If not, they should be at least average? Have they drafted poorly in the last five years? I would have to disagree with that statement, although 2007 will likely only contribute Ben Revere.

[Oxtung]

"It has been shown that if you randomly promote workers your company will be better off with more appropriate and solid workers at every level. Now that is a pretty counter-intuitive idea."

 

Sounds like a bizzare way to offset the Peter Principle.

That is exactly the driving force behind the idea. They just looked at it from a statistics angle.

[DPJ]

I see comments like this all the time, yet is it true?

 

2007...Ben Revere taken in the first round is developing into an exciting outfielder and lead off hitter. Rams and Morales second and third haven't panned out. Not a great draft, but it did have a very good one in the first round.

 

2008...Gutierrez should be here by now and Hunt was a disaster. Hicks still has the potential to be special, but is coming along more slowly, somewhat like Hunter did. Hermsen was an excellent pick in the sixth round and Pugh and Tonkin both are intiguing lower round picks. A sub-par to average draft based on how Hicks develops.

 

2009...Gibson projects as a #2 starter who had his development delayed by TJ surgery. Bashore was lost because of injuries. Bullock was used to obtain Scott Diamond. Chris Herrmann remains a solid prospect with Brian Dozier, who is starting for the Twins, having the potential to be a starter for a long time. With Gibson, Diamond, Herrmann and Dozier, certainly above average while losing a first round pick to career ending injury. If Gibson reaches his potential, a very good draft with three starters including Diamond.

 

2010...Certainly to early to tell, however, having Wimmers go down with another injury hurts. But you can't project most injuries. Goodrum, Rosario, and JaDamion Williams were high school picks who we won't know the outcome for years, however, all could be special. Dean and Darnell were both college lefties who are moving up the ladder as expected for guys taken after the first round. Toss in several pitchers, Achter, Gallant and Hauser, and you have a class that could be average or very special should Rosario and Goodrum reach their potential with Wimmers getting healthy.

 

2011...Don't need to say anything more than Boyd and Harrison. Two young kids taken high who are doing very well in their first exposure to professional ball. Add Boer, Williams and Summers and you have three college pitchers who could all make it. Then there is Burris and Malinowski who are two more young kids doing very well out of the chute at ETon. When you take a lot of high school kids you won't know for five or more years what the draft was like. Certainly too early to say this was a poor draft, however.

 

Will any of these classes be above average? 2009, 2010 and 2011 all have a real chance of being very good. If not, they should be at least average? Have they drafted poorly in the last five years? I would have to disagree with that statement, although 2007 will likely only contribute Ben Revere.

 

Roger you just poured alot of syrup on **** and called it pancakes.

[Brock Beauchamp]

My biggest issue with the Twins hitting has been their approach. The Twins seem to develop hitters who aren't great at working counts to their favor and then making the most of their opportunities.

Actually, as has been mentioned previously in this thread, the Twins have been quite good in recent years at working walks and not hacking away at bad pitches.

[diehardtwinsfan]

Roger you just poured alot of syrup on **** and called it pancakes.

Seems to me that if you can get 2 or 3 major leaguers from a draft class, you did a decent job. Am I missing something? His assessment seems fairly accurate.

[Brock Beauchamp]

Seems to me that if you can get 2 or 3 major leaguers from a draft class, you did a decent job. Am I missing something? His assessment seems fairly accurate.

If you can get two major league regulars from each draft, you're doing very well for yourself.

 

People like to polarize the Twins' drafts. It's not that simple. They haven't been world-beating drafts but they haven't been horrible, either. But as a mid-market team, they have to do better than that in drafting to stay competitive.

 

And frankly, anyone who complains about anything the Twins did in 2010 or later is just blowing smoke. It's waaaaaay too early to judge a draft as a whole until those guys spend over two years in the minor leagues.

[DPJ]

Seems to me that if you can get 2 or 3 major leaguers from a draft class, you did a decent job. Am I missing something? His assessment seems fairly accurate.

2007- As much as I hate Revere and the overdraft, I'll give it a C-. Getting nothing else not to mention the low ceiling the one player who made it kills alot of it for me.

 

2008- Gutierrez and Hunt have bombed, I still love Hicks and hold out hope but the team bombed on two first rounds pick in Gut and Hunt. If Hermsen can turn that Blackburn-like K-rate into MLB success I'll be gd shocked.

 

2009 - Loved the Gibson pick but the bottom line is he's been hurt and hasn't done **** at the major league level. The Twins made a smart move for Diamond but I need a bit more before I proclaim him a MLB starter for years to come. Dozier hasn't done **** to prove he's a major league player so that's in wait in see mode.

 

2010- Hated the Wimmers pick at the time, hate it now and I'll hate him forever. First he's wild now he's hurt...not looking good.

 

I'm not even gonna comment on any draft newer then 2010. So at the moment we have 1 MLB player in Revere and 1 backend pitcher in Diamond and it's even early IMO to label them that.

[Paul]

That is exactly the driving force behind the idea. They just looked at it from a statistics angle.

Hence the bone I have to pick with the local stat geeks. When stats are viewed in a vacuum of understanding you get wierd solutions like this. This exact thing prompted my "lace 'em up" crack a while back, that proved to be so unintentionally inflammatory.

[Bojangles]

I'm not even gonna comment on any draft newer then 2010. So at the moment we have 1 MLB player in Revere and 1 backend pitcher in Diamond and it's even early IMO to label them that.

Dozier clearly a lost cause though. Glad you left him out.

[twinswon1991]

Dozier clearly a lost cause though. Glad you left him out.

 

Utility players are a dime a dozen and I doubt he would make the big in his career in a strong organization. However I give the Twins some credit for developing a replacement level guy so they can avoid giving multi year deals to Carroll types in the future

[drjim]

I loved this interview. I found it a little funny that people were pushing back on the accountability aspect. Does Terry Ryan strike anyone as the kind of person who would like discipline or firings of lower level staff? Or would he ever use someone as a public scapegoat? This interview affirmed to me just how no nonsense he is. I imagine he is the type of guy who treats everyone with respect but will light someone up if they aren't doing their job or are taking shortcuts or being lazy.

 

I also really appreciated his answer on statistical analysis. In my mind he pretty much nailed it.

[diehardtwinsfan]

Utility players are a dime a dozen and I doubt he would make the big in his career in a strong organization. However I give the Twins some credit for developing a replacement level guy so they can avoid giving multi year deals to Carroll types in the future

Dozier's career minor league OPS is .795 and he put up a pretty nice season last year as well. His floor at this point (though very realistic) is a utility guy. But he could be a cheap starter that gets somewhere near an .800 OPS and plays average defense. That would be a very nice commodity on just about any team.

[UCLA_YANKEE_COLA]

That's my bone to pick with those who "laced 'em up". They think the stat geeks only look at fangraphs and don't actually watch the games. Stats are part of the story. A more reliable part of the story than any "well, when I played" antecdote someone who laced them up can offer.

 

Also, what exactly is a vacuum of understanding? Is it a Kirk Van Houten lyric?

[chopper0080]

Actually, as has been mentioned previously in this thread, the Twins have been quite good in recent years at working walks and not hacking away at bad pitches.

My issue is with their approach at the plate, not their plate discipline. My issue is that Twins players consistently struggle to work opposing pitchers into fastball situations, and when they do, they either miss it or take it to progress the count. I have never thought the Twins taught a free swinging approach, but I do feel they have failed to instill the desire and ability to crush mistake fastballs in hitter's counts.

[drjim]

My issue is with their approach at the plate, not their plate discipline. My issue is that Twins players consistently struggle to work opposing pitchers into fastball situations, and when they do, they either miss it or take it to progress the count. I have never thought the Twins taught a free swinging approach, but I do feel they have failed to instill the desire and ability to crush mistake fastballs in hitter's counts.

What are you possibly basing these generalities upon? Most of this comes down to talent.

[DPJ]

Dozier clearly a lost cause though. Glad you left him out.

I said I'm in wait and see mode with Dozier but he hasn't proven **** at the major league level yet.

[Seth Stohs]

If an 8th Round pick becomes even a big league utility player, that was a successful draft pick. I don't understand what some above expect. As others have said, if you get 2 big league contributors per draft, you're doing well... I read comments saying that the Twins need to be better than everyone else. OK... Do they need to be 10% better? If so, that means that if they have 2.2 players per draft get to the big leagues. That would be one player every five drafts. I don't know how to measure "better."

 

Again, 8th round picks that get to the big leagues are huge successes. 12th round picks that get to AAA are huge successes! Successes can't be solely measured by big leaguers either.

[Badsmerf]

If an 8th Round pick becomes even a big league utility player, that was a successful draft pick. I don't understand what some above expect. As others have said, if you get 2 big league contributors per draft, you're doing well... I read comments saying that the Twins need to be better than everyone else. OK... Do they need to be 10% better? If so, that means that if they have 2.2 players per draft get to the big leagues. That would be one player every five drafts. I don't know how to measure "better."

 

Again, 8th round picks that get to the big leagues are huge successes. 12th round picks that get to AAA are huge successes! Successes can't be solely measured by big leaguers either.

Who is getting 2 MLB contributors per draft? I wouldn't have an issue with the Twins drafts if they were doing this, but they aren't. Their first round picks have been ok (considering 1st round picks in the MLB), but other than that there hasn't been much. I like this last draft better than any since I've been following this team. There are a few picks that I questioned (not hated by any means), but overall it was a very good draft from my prospective. Helps they had a high pick...

[Guest USAFChief]

If an 8th Round pick becomes even a big league utility player, that was a successful draft pick. I don't understand what some above expect. As others have said, if you get 2 big league contributors per draft, you're doing well... I read comments saying that the Twins need to be better than everyone else. OK... Do they need to be 10% better? If so, that means that if they have 2.2 players per draft get to the big leagues. That would be one player every five drafts. I don't know how to measure "better."

 

Again, 8th round picks that get to the big leagues are huge successes. 12th round picks that get to AAA are huge successes! Successes can't be solely measured by big leaguers either.

"Becoming a big league utility player" isn't the goal, no matter where you draft someone. Becoming a good big league utility player is the goal. The fact that a player from a draft reaches the big leagues doesn't make that a successful draft pick.

 

Every team is going to have 25 players on the big league roster, every day. Some portion of that 25 man roster is going to come from your minor leagues, whether they deserve to be there, or help you win, or not. Every team is going to promote players from the minors to the big leagues, pretty much every year.

 

The trick isn't getting players to the big leagues. Every team does that. The trick is getting good players to the big leagues.

[clutterheart]

No question the system is not the strongest in top shelf talent at the high levels. I don't think anyone disputes that. This is due to missing on guys Danny Rams and in general a very conservative philosophy on pitchers. But you cannot discount the fact that despite their overall system-wide weakness they have drafted guys who have made the majors and one or two of them like Revere could be good ones.

 

Further its to the organizations credit that they have adapted and altered their draft strategy. They have some VERY interesting young arms, they have gone after the non "pitch-to-contact" types and they are being aggressive in the international market.

 

Sure, they had some misses but give Ryan credit for recognizing the misses, owning up to them and coming up with a plan to fix them

 

As a fan, what else can you ask for?

[Kobs]

As far as I can tell, and correct me if I'm wrong, the Twins have drafted and signed one player since Joe Mauer who is making more than $6,500,000 a year right now. The drafting has been bad for much longer than five years.

[chopper0080]

What are you possibly basing these generalities upon? Most of this comes down to talent.

 

The facts are that hitting fastballs in fastball counts is one of the easier things to do as a major league hitter. The difficulty is putting pitchers in positions where have to throw a fastball which only happens if players have a solid approach at the plate. In the end, it comes down to recognizing the situation you are in and executing accordingly. Willingham is good at this which is why he drives in runs and hits home runs. Twins hitters IN GENERAL are not. They work counts and take pitches to get into these situations, and then seem surprised when they get the pitch they should be expecting. I agree this may come down to this team not having very good hitting talent, but this wasn't the case when our team was being called piranhas and we were competitive 5 or so years ago. Now, we are rolling over and hitting into double plays or hitting high pop fly outs.