So, the Yankees tried to acquire Simmons at the deadline

[a-wan]

I would hate to see how many homeruns Jax, Barnes and Ober would have given up without Simmons and his magical glove at SS.

[ashbury]

13 minutes ago, a-wan said:

I would hate to see how many homeruns Jax, Barnes and Ober would have given up without Simmons and his magical glove at SS.

In fairness, Simmons's magical glove may have increased the chances that a given home run was a solo shot. Just ask Brent Rooker how much fun it is to hit one out with no one on.

[gunnarthor]

So just looking at fangraphs defensive values of short stops who managed 1000 innings in the field this year and Simmons ranked 16th out of 19th in def value and had a UZR150 of -1.1, second worst. In fairness, B-R liked his defense a lot better but I can't figure out how to compare Simmons B-R value with other shortstops.

Anyway, I'm not sure Simmons was worth 2 WAR based on his defense like B-R does, I thought he had a lot of boneheaded plays and had trouble on balls to his left but that's just the eye test, what do I know. But if the Yankees actually offered something for him, the Twins messed up by not moving him. I expect the Twins were trying very hard not to have the 4th pick in the draft.

 

[snap4birds]

Maybe the Yankees (kinda) wanted him, but needed to clear a roster spot, and had another deal to do that fall through? 

There are lots of possibilities, I doubt the Yankees ever really offered anything for him, probably just were in discussions with the Twins.

[nicksaviking]

11 hours ago, ashbury said:

In fairness, Simmons's magical glove may have increased the chances that a given home run was a solo shot. Just ask Brent Rooker how much fun it is to hit one out with no one on.

Well when you do hit a solo shot, at least there aren't any poser base-runners around to share your spotlight.

[Brock Beauchamp]

9 hours ago, gunnarthor said:

So just looking at fangraphs defensive values of short stops who managed 1000 innings in the field this year and Simmons ranked 16th out of 19th in def value and had a UZR150 of -1.1, second worst. In fairness, B-R liked his defense a lot better but I can't figure out how to compare Simmons B-R value with other shortstops

This one is easy:

Poorly.

Anything good I'm saying about Simmons is speaking before 2021 happened. He was mediocre in the field and Butera-esque with the bat. He was a straight-up disaster signing, though I'm mildly curious to see if he rebounds at all in 2022, hopefully - I cannot stress "HOPEFULLY" enough - in a different uniform.

[bean5302]

Baseball Reference uses Range Factor, which does not account for the shift. Range Factor ignores any plays where a fielder does not get a glove on a ball. It's a very old and limited metric developed 40 years ago so the shift wasn't a consideration. Since the Twins deploy the shift at a very high rate, their fielders frequently get more chances than average and Twins' fielders range factors get inflated as a result.

Fangraphs uses Ultimate Zone Rating, which is supposed to account for the shift by excluding fielding plays while the shift is being used. UZR attempts to account for each actual defensive play, grading on how hard the ball was to get to, etc. In my opinion, it's a far superior metric to Range Factor; however, I think UZR is also less stable and requires a lot more innings played to get good information.

Baseball Savant's Statcast data is kind of hybrid, IMO. Outs above Average tries to quantify the difficulty of getting to a ball and Runs Prevented has a pseudo-adjustment for the shift, but I don't really like the logic behind either one of them as I consider them basically the same as Range Factor with more bells and whistles kinda like OPS+ versus wRC+. There's rarely a significant difference between OPS+ and wRC+ , but wRC+ is a lot more work to calculate (and should be slightly more accurate).

The only reason Simmons looks good on RF is because he had so many more chances than the average MLB SS because of the shift, it offset the high error rate this year. Polanco benefitted greatly from this effect in recent years as well. By UZR, Polanco is arguably the worst starting shortstop in modern MLB history.

 

[KirbyDome89]

21 hours ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

I'm sure the Twins cared quite a bit whether they or the Yankees paid the remainder of Simmons' contract. He signed for $10.5m in 2021, he wasn't a chump-change signing.

For right or wrong, the Twins don't want to play Gordon or Polanco at short on a daily basis. Given what we know of Gordon's defensive ability at the position and the fact Polanco was having a career year at second and his persistent ankle concerns, I understand their reluctance to both pay for and give away Simmons at the same time.

To me, the most baffling aspect of this is why they played Polanco at short at all and why they refused to play Gordon there at all for a couple of months. Getting Gordon into one game a week at short - increasing his PAs in the process - seemed prudent and a reasonable compromise against Simmons' defense and complete lack of offensive production. And I can't imagine that Gordon is a huge dropoff defensively behind Polanco at this point in their careers. Jorge is pretty terrible at short nowadays.

But that's a rather separate conversation from whether the Twins should have given Simmons away and paid him, just so they could run bad defensive options in front of a rookie pitching staff every night for two months.

They're paying that contract regardless of whether he's soaking up valuable innings in MN and playing horribly, or being a black hole on another roster. We don't need to overthink it, the money was gone, the question was whether the playing time was more valuable for Gordon or Simmons. 

I'd imagine the young pitchers have had defenses behind them that aren't MLB starting quality during their develop track. I'm also positive that they could all be evaluated apart from subpar IF play. Two months of Gordon/Polanco/Maggi/whoever at SS wasn't going to affect the futures of Ryan or Ober, but it certainly could've had an impact for Gordon. I'm as baffled as you are when it comes to how he was handled in the 2nd half. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

19 minutes ago, KirbyDome89 said:

They're paying that contract regardless of whether he's soaking up valuable innings in MN and playing horribly, or being a black hole on another roster. We don't need to overthink it, the money was gone, the question was whether the playing time was more valuable for Gordon or Simmons. 

I'd imagine the young pitchers have had defenses behind them that aren't MLB starting quality during their develop track. I'm also positive that they could all be evaluated apart from subpar IF play. Two months of Gordon/Polanco/Maggi/whoever at SS wasn't going to affect the futures of Ryan or Ober, but it certainly could've had an impact for Gordon. I'm as baffled as you are when it comes to how he was handled in the 2nd half. 

Frankly, this is really short-sighted. Of course a pitcher is used to playing in front of sketchy defenses but what is the per-game implication of an error or missed ball at short? We've seen it a thousand times: fielder punts a ball or just doesn't have the athleticism to reach it, followed by a walk, three run blast, the pitcher is removed from the game head hanging low.

The Twins have lost a few postseason games this way, actually.

Would I have played Simmons as much as they did? No, almost certainly not. But there's something to be said for supporting a young pitching staff by not fielding a disaster behind them; playing a competent defensive shortstop is not some crazy notion.

And from a development standpoint of Gordon (whose importance of development barely registers in comparison to Ober, Ryan, Jax, Alcala, et al), exactly how much more are you going to learn about him in 340 PAs versus 270 PAs?

There's a lot of grey area here and discussion can and should happen around that but the thinking "oh just field the worst ****ing fielders behind a 24 year old guy, it doesn't matter anyway"  is a good way to really screw up young pitchers. Defense absolutely matters and being overly concerned about a potential 11th man over a handful of guys who will (hopefully) be anchoring a staff for 5+ years seems like the tail wagging the dog.

Why Twins fans are so concerned about the development of Gordon as much as they are continues to baffle me, frankly. Do I want to see Gordon play more? Absolutely. Would I have played him more? Absolutely. But I'm also going to keep my head screwed on straight and acknowledge that I should care about him the same way I cared about Denny Hocking or Nick Punto*.

Would anyone here have sacrificed a rookie pitching staff to see what they had in Hocking or Punto? I'm gonna step out on a limb here and say the answer to that is HELL NO.

*to be completely frank here, Nick Punto's career is an 80-90th percentile outcome for Nick Gordon and all I remember about Nick Punto is how much we all hated him

[gunnarthor]

1 minute ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Bolded: frankly, this is really short-sighted. Of course a pitcher is used to playing in front of sketchy defenses but what is the per-game implication of an error or missed ball at short? We've seen in a thousand times: fielder punts a ball or just doesn't have the athleticism to reach it, that's followed by a walk, three run blast, the pitcher is removed from the game hanging his head.

The Twins have lost more than one postseason game this way, actually.

Would I have played Simmons as much as they did? No, almost certainly not. But there's something to be said for supporting a young pitching staff by not fielding a disaster behind them, it's not some crazy notion.

And from a development standpoint of Gordon (whose importance of development barely registers in comparison to Ober, Ryan, Jax, Alcala, et al), exactly how much more are you going to learn about him in 340 PAs versus 270 PAs?

There's a lot of grey area here and discussion can and should happen around that but the thinking "oh just field the worst ****ing fielders behind a 24 year old guy, it doesn't matter anyway"  is a good way to really screw up young pitchers. Defense absolutely matters and being overly concerned about a potential 11th man over a handful of guys who will (hopefully) be anchoring a staff for 5+ years seems like the tail wagging the dog.

Why Twins fans are so concerned about the development of Gordon as much as they are continues to baffle me, frankly. Do I want to see Gordon play more? Absolutely. Would I have played him more? Absolutely? But I'm also going to keep my head screwed on straight and acknowledge that I should care about him the same way I cared about Denny Hocking or Nick Punto.

I don't necessarily disagree but if we had jettisoned Simmons, maybe Miranda plays second and Polanco plays short? I'm not sure how much second base Miranda got this year, I think he's more third, but maybe that would have opened a path for him.

[RpR]

1 minute ago, gunnarthor said:

I don't necessarily disagree but if we had jettisoned Simmons, maybe Miranda plays second and Polanco plays short? I'm not sure how much second base Miranda got this year, I think he's more third, but maybe that would have opened a path for him.

why would you want Polanco at short, he is horrible there; the season is not about opening paths for rookies, it is about winning games.

[Brock Beauchamp]

2 minutes ago, gunnarthor said:

I don't necessarily disagree but if we had jettisoned Simmons, maybe Miranda plays second and Polanco plays short? I'm not sure how much second base Miranda got this year, I think he's more third, but maybe that would have opened a path for him.

Given his ankle issues and flat-out bad defense, I just don't think this front office sees Polanco as a shortstop any more. And given how he performed this season, I'd be pretty wary of moving him off second, too.

If anything, I wouldn't have played Polanco at short nearly as often as they did and put Gordon in his place as backup SS.

[nicksaviking]

5 minutes ago, RpR said:

why would you want Polanco at short, he is horrible there; the season is not about opening paths for rookies, it is about winning games.

Anyone who is prioritizing winning games over player development during an already lost season, has no business running a baseball team. The young guys need playing time so that hopefully the ensuing season is not also lost.

[KirbyDome89]

4 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Frankly, this is really short-sighted. Of course a pitcher is used to playing in front of sketchy defenses but what is the per-game implication of an error or missed ball at short? We've seen in a thousand times: fielder punts a ball or just doesn't have the athleticism to reach it, followed by a walk, three run blast, the pitcher is removed from the game head hanging low.

The Twins have lost a few postseason games this way, actually.

Would I have played Simmons as much as they did? No, almost certainly not. But there's something to be said for supporting a young pitching staff by not fielding a disaster behind them, it's not some crazy notion.

And from a development standpoint of Gordon (whose importance of development barely registers in comparison to Ober, Ryan, Jax, Alcala, et al), exactly how much more are you going to learn about him in 340 PAs versus 270 PAs?

There's a lot of grey area here and discussion can and should happen around that but the thinking "oh just field the worst ****ing fielders behind a 24 year old guy, it doesn't matter anyway"  is a good way to really screw up young pitchers. Defense absolutely matters and being overly concerned about a potential 11th man over a handful of guys who will (hopefully) be anchoring a staff for 5+ years seems like the tail wagging the dog.

Why Twins fans are so concerned about the development of Gordon as much as they are continues to baffle me, frankly. Do I want to see Gordon play more? Absolutely. Would I have played him more? Absolutely? But I'm also going to keep my head screwed on straight and acknowledge that I should care about him the same way I cared about Denny Hocking or Nick Punto.

I don't see Gordon/Polanco/Maggi/whoever for 2 months as a disaster. Maybe it starts and ends there, but I'm certainly not arguing for "fielding the worst f***ing fielders." This isn't an A or B situation, it's not Gordon vs. "insert young pitcher here." 

I'm not making Gordon out to be anything other than a potential utility guy, the disagreement is with how the audition opportunity was used, and the rationale for why it was limited. I think the argument that average SS defense for 2 months is more valuable than a potential utility player for multiple years is weak. 

Simmons comes up to bat with RISP, makes weak contact to end the inning, takes the field and boots a transfer or throw, the opposing team has a big inning, and the pitcher leaves with his head hung. We've seen that a few times this year too, I wasn't worried how it'd affect the young arms, and I doubt you were either. 

[KirbyDome89]

20 hours ago, bean5302 said:

I'm not a fan of the Twins keeping Simmons. I would have rather them play Gordon or Palacios at SS every day than Simmons, but they had a different opinion than me. Other fans on the site have used the explanation Simmons provided a boost to young pitchers with the perception he provided good defense or it's possible the Twins believed Simmons was just in a bad year and wanted to keep him in good graces to potentially sign him at a very low contract value next year.

I'm just pointing out the Yankees (and other teams) probably thought there was a good chance the Twins were going to DFA and release Simmons after he cleared waivers so there wasn't a good reason to trade prospects or eat any of Simmons' contract when he could be resigned for league minimum without any prospect capital lost. In fact, I think it was pretty surprising to most people Simmons wasn't DFA'd. 

At the end of the day, it played out the way it did. The Twins had their reasons and the Yankees had theirs.

I doubt (hope) the Twins strategy wasn't to continue to run Simmons out there every day to tank his value, at the expense of playing Gordon, so they resign him at a discount in the offseason. I believe the roster spot and subsequent playing time being allocated elsewhere was pretty valuable, so my disagreement is with the notion that the Twins weren't receiving anything by "giving Simmons away." 

[Brock Beauchamp]

4 minutes ago, KirbyDome89 said:

I'm not making Gordon out to be anything other than a potential utility guy

Then why is this even worth a conversation? It's highly likely Gordon is on the team in a role next season and you (and I) don't believe he'll be more than a utility guy.

So why is so much consternation being displayed over a fringe decision that likely didn't change a single outcome this offseason?

[RpR]

10 minutes ago, KirbyDome89 said:

 takes the field and boots a transfer or throw, the opposing team has a big inning, and the pitcher leaves with his head hung. We've seen that a few times this year too, I wasn't worried how it'd affect the young arms, and I doubt you were either. 

Really now his Rtot and Rdrs were both 14, far from his best year still far better than average; please what game did Simmons error cause a big inning?

His life time average of errors is 10 per season, this year he had 12, lot better than the 22 Polanco had at short his full season.

[TheLeviathan]

1 hour ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Frankly, this is really short-sighted. Of course a pitcher is used to playing in front of sketchy defenses but what is the per-game implication of an error or missed ball at short? We've seen it a thousand times: fielder punts a ball or just doesn't have the athleticism to reach it, followed by a walk, three run blast, the pitcher is removed from the game head hanging low.

The Twins have lost a few postseason games this way, actually.

Would I have played Simmons as much as they did? No, almost certainly not. But there's something to be said for supporting a young pitching staff by not fielding a disaster behind them; playing a competent defensive shortstop is not some crazy notion.

And from a development standpoint of Gordon (whose importance of development barely registers in comparison to Ober, Ryan, Jax, Alcala, et al), exactly how much more are you going to learn about him in 340 PAs versus 270 PAs?

There's a lot of grey area here and discussion can and should happen around that but the thinking "oh just field the worst ****ing fielders behind a 24 year old guy, it doesn't matter anyway"  is a good way to really screw up young pitchers. Defense absolutely matters and being overly concerned about a potential 11th man over a handful of guys who will (hopefully) be anchoring a staff for 5+ years seems like the tail wagging the dog.

Why Twins fans are so concerned about the development of Gordon as much as they are continues to baffle me, frankly. Do I want to see Gordon play more? Absolutely. Would I have played him more? Absolutely. But I'm also going to keep my head screwed on straight and acknowledge that I should care about him the same way I cared about Denny Hocking or Nick Punto*.

Would anyone here have sacrificed a rookie pitching staff to see what they had in Hocking or Punto? I'm gonna step out on a limb here and say the answer to that is HELL NO.

*to be completely frank here, Nick Punto's career is an 80-90th percentile outcome for Nick Gordon and all I remember about Nick Punto is how much we all hated him

I think saying Nick Gordon is comparable to Denny Hocking is completely unfair framework to the discussion.  

Nick Gordon is a former top pick with a ton of pedigree.  He's not Nick Punto or Denny Hocking in terms of upside, even if that's all he ultimately ends up as.  Investing ANY playing time into a black hole of awful like Andrelton Simmons when there is a lottery ticket worth scratching is the issue. 

Just like I give credit to the FO for the Simmons signing as a strategy/process move that was a good idea idea, bad result; I can't give them any credit for sticking with a black hole in a lost season when there is a young player to test out.  It's a flat-out bad process to engage in with a lost season.

[Brock Beauchamp]

12 minutes ago, TheLeviathan said:

I think saying Nick Gordon is comparable to Denny Hocking is completely unfair framework to the discussion.  

Nick Gordon is a former top pick with a ton of pedigree.  He's not Nick Punto or Denny Hocking in terms of upside, even if that's all he ultimately ends up as.  Investing ANY playing time into a black hole of awful like Andrelton Simmons when there is a lottery ticket worth scratching is the issue. 

Just like I give credit to the FO for the Simmons signing as a strategy/process move that was a good idea idea, bad result; I can't give them any credit for sticking with a black hole in a lost season when there is a young player to test out.  It's a flat-out bad process to engage in with a lost season.

See, and this is where I think people just aren't paying attention and contextualizing what we're discussing here.

Dee Gordon has been a pretty good baseball player, right? I'd say his career is the ceiling of what we can expect from his brother, Nick.

Guess who has more career rWAR than Dee Gordon?

Nick Punto.

Marwin Gonzalez was the ultimate "tenth man" in baseball, right? I'd say his career is the ceiling of Nick Gordon.

I'll give you one guess who has more career rWAR than Marwin Gonzalez.

I'd say I'm putting some rather fair framework on this discussion.

And while I disagree with how often they played Simmons, it is NOT bad process to protect a pitching staff loaded with rookies, pitchers you expect to anchor a staff for years to come, with a competent shortstop behind them. It's just not.

[TheLeviathan]

8 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

See, and this is where I think people just aren't paying attention and contextualizing what we're discussing here.

Dee Gordon has been a pretty good baseball player, right? I'd say his career is the ceiling of what we can expect from his brother, Nick.

Guess who has more career rWAR than Dee Gordon?

Nick Punto.

Marwin Gonzalez was the ultimate "tenth man" in baseball, right? I'd say his career is the ceiling of Nick Gordon.

I'll give you one guess who has more career rWAR than Marwin Gonzalez.

I'd say I'm putting some rather fair framework on this discussion.

And while I disagree with how often they played Simmons, it is NOT bad process to protect a pitching staff loaded with rookies, pitchers you expect to anchor a staff for years to come, with a competent shortstop behind them. It's just not.

But then you cited Denny Hocking.  I notice you didn't use him as an example.  

As for WAR, I'm still not much of a believer in the way defense is over-balanced in that calculation relative to offense.  Looking at Dee Gordon's career and Nick Punto's and concluding that Punto was more valuable is not an endorsement of your point as much as an indictment of WAR.

[KirbyDome89]

1 hour ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Then why is this even worth a conversation? It's highly likely Gordon is on the team in a role next season and you (and I) don't believe he'll be more than a utility guy.

So why is so much consternation being displayed over a fringe decision that likely didn't change a single outcome this offseason?

Because having a utility player in house is more valuable than not having one? If Gordon doesn't absolutely kill it in September he easily could've been a roster casualty. I just don't see running Simmons out there to play OK defense worth what's potentially being given up, regardless of what Gordon becomes.

[Brock Beauchamp]

1 hour ago, TheLeviathan said:

But then you cited Denny Hocking.  I notice you didn't use him as an example.  

As for WAR, I'm still not much of a believer in the way defense is over-balanced in that calculation relative to offense.  Looking at Dee Gordon's career and Nick Punto's and concluding that Punto was more valuable is not an endorsement of your point as much as an indictment of WAR.

Hocking and Punto were a range of outcomes for part-time players. One bad, one good. No, I didn't point out that Hocking was the bad outcome, I assumed that was implied.

If you don't want to use WAR, then choose a metric of your liking.

But the ultimate point here is threefold:

1. What great revelation would have come out of seeing Gordon for an additional 75-100 PAs and how would it have swayed opinion so much that it makes this a hill to die on?

2. How hard are you willing to make life on rookie pitchers to see "what you have" in a guy that profiles as a bench player, maybe not even a 300 PA bench player?

3. In the end, the outcome was the bloody same so why does this matter? And for the love of god, stop saying "process" because, again, we're talking about a 10th/11th man that is likely to make the roster either way. "Process" is not "what I wanted to see and all other options are invalid". There is a lot of nuance here and the word "process" does not patch up what is ultimately a difference of opinion and priority, both of which have legitimate points to make and things to consider.

[nicksaviking]

Whether or not they should have been giving Jax, Barnes and Gant a more competent SS to field behind them, or whether they should have instead given playing time to Gordon, it still boils down to the biggest problem in my book.

They are still evaluating the absolute lowest floor guys first. Players who profile to be the 25th or 26th guy on the roster. What an absolute debacle. I'm glad we got to see Ryan, but not a single MLB pitch for Balazovic, Duran, Winder, Woods-Richardson, Strotman or Sands. No MLB ABs for Lewis, Miranda or Martin.

Not all the organization's fault; certainly there were plenty of injuries. But some of the hold backs were of the team's own prerogative. Some guys were a level or two too far away from the majors, but quite a few guys are seeing painfully slow promotions. It wasn't a requirement that 23-year-old college players had to restart at the same level they ended pre-covid. There were no rules that pitchers have to go to St. Paul to get their feet wet.

Just really frustrating. And again, not all the organization's fault.

[Brock Beauchamp]

41 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

They are still evaluating the absolute lowest floor guys first. Players who profile to be the 25th or 26th guy on the roster. What an absolute debacle. I'm glad we got to see Ryan, but not a single MLB pitch for Balazovic, Duran, Winder, Woods-Richardson, Strotman or Sands. No MLB ABs for Lewis, Miranda or Martin.

Except every player you listed here fell into one of four categories:

1. Injured
2. Mediocre/Bad
3. Young & Inexperienced
4. Jose Miranda

If you bullet point out the season of each player, it becomes a lot more understandable why this all shook out as it did. I mean, maybe they could have promoted Austin Martin but I don't see much immediate upside there. He was acquired in August, is in AA, 22 years old, and hasn't developed nearly the power the team wants to see from him. Nobody else was ready. Balazovic had a yo-yo season and looked very good at times in Wichita but when should the Twins have promoted him, after 40 IP? That's a massive jump for the guy after being injured.

I'll give you Jose Miranda, though. I thought there was little excuse not to see him in a Twins uniform at some point in the season.

[TheLeviathan]

23 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Hocking and Punto were a range of outcomes for part-time players. One bad, one good. No, I didn't point out that Hocking was the bad outcome, I assumed that was implied.

If you don't want to use WAR, then choose a metric of your liking.

But the ultimate point here is threefold:

1. What great revelation would have come out of seeing Gordon for an additional 75-100 PAs and how would it have swayed opinion so much that it makes this a hill to die on?

2. How hard are you willing to make life on rookie pitchers to see "what you have" in a guy that profiles as a bench player, maybe not even a 300 PA bench player?

3. In the end, the outcome was the bloody same so why does this matter? And for the love of god, stop saying "process" because, again, we're talking about a 10th/11th man that is likely to make the roster either way. "Process" is not "what I wanted to see and all other options are invalid". There is a lot of nuance here and the word "process" does not patch up what is ultimately a difference of opinion and priority.

You are entitled to an opinion, but when you comp Gordon's upside and Denny Hocking you've stopped allowing a fair discussion because you've gone off the rails.  This conversation is, at least partially, about process.  The process of how you go about investing your available time, resource, at-bats, development etc. in a losing season.  You didn't, in any way, distinguish your Denny Hocking and Nick Punto reference as a good outcome/bad outcome.  Maybe you meant to, but you clearly didn't.  You stated that we should care as much about Nick Gordon as we do "Denny Hocking or Nick Punto" and that's just ridiculously unfair.

Nick Gordon, as a potential investment, is a hell of a lot more intriguing than either of those guys.  Is that a guarantee of anything?  Of course not, no one is claiming any such thing.  Is it arguable that playing Simmons to help the young pitchers is a more valuable asset than playing Gordon?  Sure, that's possible.  I think you'd have to breakdown just how many difference making plays in 56 games Simmons can make over Gordon relative to the potential in his bat, but it's possible. But then let's make that argument and not some asinine one that Gordon's upside is limited to Denny Hocking.  

Teams get paid off investing opportunities into young players with potential all the time.  Twins included, we could come up with a laundry list of impactful Twins who helped the organization out of nowhere because we gave them a chance.  And many of those guys had nowhere near the raw talent and pedigree of Gordon.  Pretending Gordon has no such potential isn't fair.  I acknowledge that a bad SS behind the pitchers could be detrimental and I understand that.  I acknowledge that Gordon might flop entirely.  But here's what I do know:  Simmons offers a terrible bat, no future upside, and a selfish mindset.  When my favorite team is terrible, those aren't the kind of players I want to invest opportunity in.  I just don't think the difference in fielding, in a third of a season (less than that because, as you know, the Twins stopped caring about their young pitchers being harmed by his absence in September) is enough to offset the value in getting a longer look at Gordon.  An extra 100 PAs almost certainly doesn't shake the foundation of the team, but it's a better mindset of team growth IMO.

Instead the Twins did the worst of all options - they didn't dump him, played him for a few weeks in which time they bounced Gordon around unnecessarily, then stopped playing him altogether and played Gordon there.  That's splitting the middle of both opinions into a stupid middle ground that makes zero sense.

[nicksaviking]

3 hours ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Except every player you listed here fell into one of four categories:

1. Injured
2. Mediocre/Bad
3. Young & Inexperienced
4. Jose Miranda

If you bullet point out the season of each player, it becomes a lot more understandable why this all shook out as it did. I mean, maybe they could have promoted Austin Martin but I don't see much immediate upside there. He was acquired in August, is in AA, 22 years old, and hasn't developed nearly the power the team wants to see from him. Nobody else was ready. Balazovic had a yo-yo season and looked very good at times in Wichita but when should the Twins have promoted him, after 40 IP? That's a massive jump for the guy after being injured.

I'll give you Jose Miranda, though. I thought there was little excuse not to see him in a Twins uniform at some point in the season.

Except for Duran, every one of those pitchers did pitch this year AFTER the Twins were out of contention and AFTER they started running out guys like Jax, Barnes, Farrell, Coulombe, Albers, Garza, Burroughs, Vincent and Barraclough. 

Unless the Twins are still being coy about the service time thing, there seemed little reason not to put the high upside guys on the mound at the MLB level. You're going to get a better evaluation there against MLB hitters than you are at AA and AAA.

And if these guys aren't mentally tough enough to handle getting their butts handed to them when they get to the show, then I'd never want them on a playoff roster anyway. It's not a coincidence that the only starting pitcher worth a damn that this team has developed in 15 years got his clocked cleaned his rookie year and bounced back to be fantastic. They have to stop worrying about this stuff and just start tossing these guys in the deep end. The one's who can dog paddle out alive on their own are pretty much the only one's you're going to want to rely on anyway. Look at the White Sox rotation, the only young guys that made it took a several years of beatings. I don't believe that extra AAA time is going to cut those growing pains down. Get it over with now, let them get rocked and see what happens in a year or two.

[Original_JB]

Kirby Puckett.  1982: 65 games in the Rookie League;  1983: 138 games at A; 1984: 21 games at AAA and then came up and played 128 games for the Twins that same season.  *young and inexperienced*

[RpR]

It is amazing how so many of those posting here think the Major League is the same as the Minors, i.e. a place where rookies learn to be ball players.

Larnach and Rooker were destroyed statistically in the Majors, that can ruin a rookies mind set easily; they came up because they were last resort, (Rooker was already destroyed in Spring games, and Celestino should never have been brought up) as rookies in front of them and with better result were also injured. (I am curious how Garlick does next year, sadly Ref. ended up looking like Celestino when he came back .)

Regular season is about winning, so the stands are not empty, NOT another minor league crap-shoot.

[Brock Beauchamp]

1 hour ago, Original_JB said:

Kirby Puckett.  1982: 65 games in the Rookie League;  1983: 138 games at A; 1984: 21 games at AAA and then came up and played 128 games for the Twins that same season.  *young and inexperienced*

A wildly different era with wildly different rules of operation.

And still, Puckett made his MLB debut as a 24 year old.

[Brock Beauchamp]

17 hours ago, nicksaviking said:

Except for Duran, every one of those pitchers did pitch this year AFTER the Twins were out of contention and AFTER they started running out guys like Jax, Barnes, Farrell, Coulombe, Albers, Garza, Burroughs, Vincent and Barraclough. 

Unless the Twins are still being coy about the service time thing, there seemed little reason not to put the high upside guys on the mound at the MLB level. You're going to get a better evaluation there against MLB hitters than you are at AA and AAA.

And if these guys aren't mentally tough enough to handle getting their butts handed to them when they get to the show, then I'd never want them on a playoff roster anyway. It's not a coincidence that the only starting pitcher worth a damn that this team has developed in 15 years got his clocked cleaned his rookie year and bounced back to be fantastic. They have to stop worrying about this stuff and just start tossing these guys in the deep end. The one's who can dog paddle out alive on their own are pretty much the only one's you're going to want to rely on anyway. Look at the White Sox rotation, the only young guys that made it took a several years of beatings. I don't believe that extra AAA time is going to cut those growing pains down. Get it over with now, let them get rocked and see what happens in a year or two.

Okay, then let me frame it this way: instead of generalizations about bunch of players with different timelines and situations, give me a player and date they should have been called to play in Minnesota.

Excepting Miranda, as we agree on that front.