Ralph Garza Jr. claimed by Minnesota Twins

[Rosterman]

When I saw that the Astros had put this guy on waivers, I thought "this would be a nice pick-up for the Twins."

 

Plus, they had the 40-man roster spot opened. Just another arm to give a tryout for the 2022 bullpen.

 

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/08/twins-claim-ralph-garza-jr-waivers-astros.html

 

 

[Mike Sixel]

Maybe, I don't know, start trying them NOW so you have more data on them (not this guy, necessarily, but they have A LOT or potential RPs in AAA / AA).

[nicksaviking]

1 hour ago, Rosterman said:

When I saw that the Astros had put this guy on waivers, I thought "this would be a nice pick-up for the Twins."

 

Can't say that occurred to me, but when I saw he was a reliever and his FB sat at 92 MPH, I thought "yeah, that sounds like a Twins pick-up".

[sampleSizeOfOne]

No relation to that other Garza we traded a while back, i presume?

[RickOShea]

Another low nineties mph relief pitcher.  Just enough zip to get it to the plate and provide some exit power.  This eternal love affair for pitching to contact, whether planned or not, is creating an abyss between our bullpen and the rest of the league's bullpens.

What's even worse, we can't even pitch to contact effectively, with the high number and ill-timed walks.  Stevenson's homer was earmarked as the difference in today's game.  Nobody mentioned the 2 out walk to Farmer, which fanned the fire that turned into a 4 run Red scoring outburst.   Yes, everyone walks batters.  But the Twins have cornered the market on the most inopportune timed walk.  It's not always what you do, but it's when you do it.

[nicksaviking]

1 hour ago, RickOShea said:

Another low nineties mph relief pitcher.  Just enough zip to get it to the plate and provide some exit power.  This eternal love affair for pitching to contact, whether planned or not, is creating an abyss between our bullpen and the rest of the league's bullpens.

What's even worse, we can't even pitch to contact effectively, with the high number and ill-timed walks.  Stevenson's homer was earmarked as the difference in today's game.  Nobody mentioned the 2 out walk to Farmer, which fanned the fire that turned into a 4 run Red scoring outburst.   Yes, everyone walks batters.  But the Twins have cornered the market on the most inopportune timed walk.  It's not always what you do, but it's when you do it.

While I'm very critical of the organization's ability to develop power arms or even effective arms, I'm very confident they are not intentionally pitching to contact any longer. Clearly that was the last regime's MO, but this group just doesn't seem to have the knack for finding guys with good velocity yet still have usable command.

Typically your pitch-to-contact arms are the guys who throw two seemed fastballs. They are supposed to induce weak contact and groundballs. But the Twins are 28th in the league in groundball percentage since 2017 when the front office took over. Every sinkerballer they've had or signed, they immediately worked on reducing the usage of the pitch. These guys just can't figure out how to draft, develop or even sign useful high-octane arms even while other teams seem to mange loading their whole pen with such pitchers.

[gunnarthor]

I'm a little surprised we gave this guy a 40 man spot but, ok. I would like to see us start moving some of our AAA pitchers up and see what they can do. I expect Ryan will get a shot this year after the Olympics. Probably Winder should as well.

[Dodecahedron]

There is nothing to dislike about this.  We are getting too nitpicky in our judgments.