Sorry...Buxton is a flop

[Mike Sixel]

I also don't think he's a flop.

 

that doesn't mean, imo, that we can't wonder why he's not good.......this isn't a random prospect. I suppose it is  just possibly that the Twins leadership is 100% off on his readiness. That raises other questions.....

[TheLeviathan]

He's looked bad, but his injury history is a factor in my patience.  I think he's been rushed and we're judging him unfairly for being put in a spot he's not ready for.

[alarp33]

 

It's probably unusual for a player, on the verge of McCutchen level success as gunnarthor predicted earlier in this thread, to regress to the point of 4-for-24 with 13 K's and zero walks.  No hate here, it's just an unusual step.  Hopefully he steps out of it pretty quickly.

 

Might as well write these All Stars off as well, they HAVE to be over the hill, no?

 

Todd Frazier is 6/37

Kyle Seager is 5/33

Adam Jones is 2/14

Freddie Freeman 2/25

 

[jimmer]

okay, I'm done with this.

[Wizard11]

I can understand the Buxton anxiety. Many Twins fans remember top prospects like David McCarty, David West, and Todd Walker. All were VERY highly touted. The frustrating truth is none of us really know how Buxton is going to develop. Personally, I like Buck's tool set and youth is on his side. It was unfortunate that expectations were so jacked up for him. Imo he will develop into a star player. I do wonder though about the Twins organizational process for teaching plate discipline. Seems a bit lacking

[alarp33]

 

okay, I'm done with this.

 

Ditto. We're spinning wheels here.  

 

I will never agree that even 150 plate appearances is an accurate sample size, let alone 24.

 

 And it appears others aren't going to believe in the Buxton tools until they see it in the bigs, certainly your right. 

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

Might as well write these All Stars off as well, they HAVE to be over the hill, no?

 

Todd Frazier is 6/37

Kyle Seager is 5/33

Adam Jones is 2/14

Freddie Freeman 2/25

Seriously?  Yeah, if you repeatedly ignore strikeouts, walks, power, and various other quantitative and qualitative measures, which you are doing here in this post and you previously did when you judged Trout's 2011 performance as comparably bad to Buxton's MLB career to date, yeah you probably aren't that worried about Buxton.  I also won't particularly trust your forecasts for him, though.

[alarp33]

 

Seriously?  Yeah, if you repeatedly ignore strikeouts, walks, power, and various other quantitative and qualitative measures, which you are doing here in this post and you previously did when you judged Trout's 2011 performance as comparably bad to Buxton's MLB career to date, yeah you probably aren't that worried about Buxton.  I also won't particularly trust your forecasts for him, though.

 

Adam Jones has half the number of extra base hits, the same amount of walks, and a 43% K rate. So, I guess fairly valid.  I mean you've already told me the 14 or 24 at bats, whatever they have is all you need to see

 

 

* Just a note to anyone just reading this post, I'm only being facetious. I don't actually believe Adam Jones is done based off of 14 at bats, just trying to convey the absurdity of some of these judgments based on 7 games

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

Adam Jones has half the number of extra base hits, the same amount of walks, and a 43% K rate. So, I guess fairly valid.  I mean you've already told me the 14 or 24 at bats, whatever they have is all you need to see

I'm done with this too.  Not worth the internet points.

[twinssouth]

The headline reads "Sorry, Buxton is a flop"

 

 

My response, Buxton is NOT a flop

 

 

 

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

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. 

 

I think the problem is that they've been set to unrealistic. 

[h2oface]

 

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.  

 

prospect fatigue - great term. I know I have it. 

[ScrapTheNickname]

 

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.

4 years ago actually, but your point is clear.

[h2oface]

 

I don't think the Twins would jetttison him at 24.

 

If you're just trolling for "when should the Twins expect him to be McCutchen" I don't have any idea.  I personally think he'll be there by the end of the season.  His history of promotions shows that it takes him a couple months to adjust to new levels.  Give him extra time since he basically skipped AAA but I think the Buxton we see in Sept will be a lot different from the one we are seeing now.

 

With how Ryan has traded center fielders, and when he as done it, nothing would surprise me.

 

I like the optimism! I think it is just to expect a prospect that every prognosticator in the world has been saying how great he is going to be since he was drafted..... I think it is just and fair to expect him to be one of the few that hit the league and perform to expectations. I hope the Twins keep him in the show and let Molitor, the hitter, and the rest of the MLB staff help him. Youth is the future and the future is now.

[Rosterman]

He is going to be our centerfielder for 15 years. Extend his contract NOW!

 

[Pius Jefferson]

He doesn't have to be great right away but does he have to look so lost?

[jimmer]

 

With how Ryan has traded center fielders, and when he as done it, nothing would surprise me.

 

I like the optimism! I think it is just to expect a prospect that every prognosticator in the world has been saying how great he is going to be since he was drafted..... I think it is just and fair to expect him to be one of the few that hit the league and perform to expectations. I hope the Twins keep him in the show and let Molitor, the hitter, and the rest of the MLB staff help him. Youth is the future and the future is now.

In fairness not all the prognosticators have been on the Buxton bandwagon.  Quite a few Fangraphs ones haven't.  Dave Cameron definitely didn't buy the hype.  He likes Confronto better.

[Minniman]

 

Sorry, hard to find the stats but my memory is that he started out very slow and in the neighborhood of .150 and worked his way back to near .250 by the end.     ST stats are not all that meaningful but I would say a similar progression is reasonable to expect going forward.

 

If a veteran .300 hitter hits .280 in spring training, it is no big deal. If a guy who is barely in the Bigs struggles in spring training, that is meaningful.

 

By similar progression, was he expected to hit .350 this year?

 

Buxton did go from striking out every game to striking out every two or three games, and that is good. He went back to striking out almost every game this season. It was obvious he was not ready for major league pitching.

 

[Jham]

Interesting discussion.  Some of the posters are debating semantics, some are debating extremes.  My take on things is this.  

Part of the confusion is probably the old school tools evaluation.  Buxton has 5 tool potential, but that the two hit tools aren't fully developed.  And neither account for K's.  His defense and athleticism are fantastic, but likely to gradually decline as he ages while his bat improves.  This makes it awfully tempting to rush him up in order to take advantage of his youth and athleticism while his bat develops.  

 

The Mike Trout comparisons are several years old.  Expectations have already been tempered among scouts.  Put the guys he was ranked against who have graduated to the bigs, and suddenly Buxton isn't a top 2 prospect anymore.  Trout's continued level of success is amazing, Buxton has not developed at the same rate.  More recent comparisons have been McCutchen or Justin Upton on upside.  The bottom range of the prospect scale is never really mentioned.  People just hear "Trout" or "McCutchen" and they expect MVP seasons.  But those comparisons were best case scenarios from the beginning, and not really expectations.  Or they shouldn't be.  For every Trout there's a BJ Upton or Austin Jackson.

The fairest way to assess Buxton is to temper your expectations to something more realistic from the beginning.  Predictions here tend to range from MVP caliber to league average bat.  Those seem like reasonable parameters.  Let's aim for somewhere in the middle.  Gomez is a good comparison, although his initial struggles were over-aggression, Buxton seems to me, to be too tentative, which leads to my third takeaway.

There is a risk of stunting a player's development by sticking him in too early.  It was fashionable to blame Santana's BABIP for his horrible 2015, but HR aren't factored into BABIP.  He went from 7 to 0.  He got tentative and started slowing down his bat, trying not to strike out, which led to bad approaches, bad swings, and more K's.  Point is, striking out all the time can lead to horrible habits.  Rather than learning to read pitchers, read pitches, and stick to your approach, you go up with a survival approach.  Gomez never had that.  Ozzie doesn't have that.  Santana had that, Hicks had that, and Buxton looks to be getting that.  I'm not sure it's a good thing that he's striking out after 7 pitches instead of 4 if it means he's more tentative, ie fouling off pitches that he was whiffing at in exchange for not hitting the pitches he used to crush.  That's what people are describing when they say "over-matched".  The danger with Buxton, is that he's smart enough, and talented enough to likely gain a level of progress just trying to survive.  But survival will only get him to those bottom projections.

Personally, I think Delmon's career was stunted in this manner.  He was called up early, he could hit a fastball along way.  He flailed at breaking balls.  By the time he left the Twins, he could hit a hanging breaking ball, but a good fastball was a foul or swing and miss.  Your success as a big leaguer is pretty limited if you're fighting off fastballs and trying to hit breaking balls.  He was talented enough to hang around doing that, but his career is disappointing in comparison to his potential.  

 

I'd like to see Buxton go down to AAA to work on confidence and approach.  Worry more about pitch selection and hitting your pitch then fighting off their pitch.  I think he'll be at least as good as Gomez, but probably not for 2 years.  We used an option year last year when we didn't need to. There's a very real possibility that he'll be nearing but not at max potential at the time he's looking for a contract extension.  If he shows signs of breaking out or has 1 great season, but hasn't done it consistently, but wants a huge deal, well at that point we screwed ourselves.  We'll have to overpay for a risky contract (Mauer situation), lose him as he's reaching his prime (Hunter), or we'll have to trade him because of that one or two weeks last August.

 

[Dantes929]

 

If a veteran .300 hitter hits .280 in spring training, it is no big deal. If a guy who is barely in the Bigs struggles in spring training, that is meaningful.

 

By similar progression, was he expected to hit .350 this year?

 

Buxton did go from striking out every game to striking out every two or three games, and that is good. He went back to striking out almost every game this season. It was obvious he was not ready for major league pitching.

I will go back to a previous statement.   Some of his learning is on the job.   I am ok with that.    He has a history of slow starts and as long as he IS learning  this can be a very good thing.   If he loses confidence that is a different matter.     If he is cutting down on strikeouts that means he is adjusting and aggressiveness will come.    I didn't expect him to hit .300 or anywhere close out of the gate.   Give him a couple hundred at bats and if his 2nd hundred aren't better than his first hundred then revisit.

[spinowner]

I tried to read all the posts in this thread but I just couldn't do it.

No player who was on an MLB roster at age 21 is a flop at age 22. Especially in a case where the player has missed essentially a full season of minor league experience due to injury. Age 26, maybe. Not age 22. Sorry...the premise of this thread is a flop.

 

 

[mazeville]

 

I get what you are saying, but one cannot ignore his performance because he is on a bad team. If we were talking about him not getting RBIs or not getting good deep count pitches, I could see that, but swinging at pitches in the dirt and not swinging at pitches over the plate cannot be excused by being in a bad lineup.

 

It is a bad situation for many of these players because their is no veteran leadership presence on this team. This is not a mix of quality veterans and a few young players; it is a team with young or suspect players up and down the lineup card.

 

This team has plenty of veteran leadership. That's not the issue. It's just a team that had a very, very, very bad start. 

 

Fact is, Buxton has always been expected to have a bad start. Everybody knew that. It's hardly surprising that he's playing poorly to start the season. If he is still struggling like this in June, then this is a real problem. But it's April. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Fact is, Buxton has always been expected to have a bad start. Everybody knew that. It's hardly surprising that he's playing poorly to start the season. If he is still struggling like this in June, then this is a real problem. But it's April. 

I'd say it's a problem if Buxton is still struggling like this in mid-May but whatever. What's important is that we see progress in his peripherals, not an OPS of .700 or better right off the bat (though that'd be nice).

 

SSS applies but Buxton started the season this way:

 

19 PAs, 3 H, 11 K

 

And since then, has gone:

 

9 PAs, 2 H, 2 K

 

Patience, young Padawans. We need to see how Buxton responds to seeing pitches every day and gets into the groove of a new season.

 

If he continues hitting a bit over .200 with a lowered K rate, I'd continue throwing him out there every day. What's important is the progression, not necessarily the performance; that will come in time if Byron continues to work on pitch selection and contact.

[Loosey]

Pitch recognition is his biggest issue in my opinion.  That takes time to learn.  Keep throwing him out there and let him see the nastiest stuff available.  Once he figures out how to determine a slider from a fastball I think he takes off.  Right now he is guessing.  And when he guesses right he hits the ball pretty hard, so the talent clearly is there from a hitting ability standpoint.

[tobi0040]

I'd say it's a problem if Buxton is still struggling like this in mid-May but whatever. What's important is that we see progress in his peripherals, not an OPS of .700 or better right off the bat (though that'd be nice).

 

SSS applies but Buxton started the season this way:

 

19 PAs, 3 H, 11 K

 

And since then, has gone:

 

9 PAs, 2 H, 2 K

 

Patience, young Padawans. We need to see how Buxton responds to seeing pitches every day and gets into the groove of a new season.

 

If he continues hitting a bit over .200 with a lowered K rate, I'd continue throwing him out there every day. What's important is the progression, not necessarily the performance; that will come in time if Byron continues to work on pitch selection and contact.

Yeah, when one triple bumps his OPS almost 100 basis points, the sample maybe a tad small.

 

I would also point out that his defensive value has more than offset his offense (+.3 dWAR and even oWAR according to BREF). .3 dWAR in 9 starts is a 5.4 dWAR over a year. So he is not exactly killing the team as he gets up to speed.

[Linus]

My own observation is that he's getting better. As long as he is progressing that's the key. Some of the progression may not be reflected in stats.

[dxpavelka]

Maybe we should trade him for David Ortiz so Big Pappy can end his career  here like Jared Allen did.

[tobi0040]

Through 2012 he was playing high school baseball, with reports of the competition being sub par. From 2012 to 2014 he was in rookie leagues, low A, and high A. Then he had a concussion.

 

In the 20 months since his concussion he has been in AA for 59 games, AAA for 13 games, and in the majors for about 50 games.

 

So over the last 20 months he is simultaneously working his way back from a concussion AND seeing breaking balls he has never seen before. I am not sure why Span, Morneau, and Mauer (two former league MVP's) get a two year pass after their concussions but we don’t even mention Buxton’s.

 

I give him another month, he has already started to look better at the plate. And Geez, he is one 4-4 game from a .257 average. As I mentioned, his defense and his base running more than make up for his bat right now anyways. He gets to add some value for us and get a look at the breaking balls he needs to work on.

[Twodogs]

 

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.

Buxton is hitting .172 and Sano is hitting .190.  So do you think Sano's growth will be stunted also?  They aren't performing to differently?

[Twodogs]

I think Buxton will be fine.