How long before you give up on player?

[Trov]

This is not about any player in particular.  I was thinking the other day on two main questions.  First, how long does a player need to have some level of success before you trust they will break out of a down turn, or slump?  How long into a down turn or slump do you stick with that player before giving up?  History may suggest it is a combo kind of thing.  

I know many will look to are the results reflective of underlying numbers.  Looking at Correa early on his numbers were not good, but he was hitting the ball hard, and he had years of success, so of course you expect he would break out.  We have seen some guys have breakout years in contract seasons and people praise them thinking that will be the long term expectations.  

So how long does a player need to perform at a certain level before you say, that is who they are?  I am sure to the teams there is a lot more that goes into it, like attitude, work ethic, willingness to adjust, money being paid, and so on.  But as a fan, when do you adjust your expectations?  When do you give up on a guy, or accept they have turned a page?  

For example, just this year, Jose Miranda, a rookie, has put up a -0.5 WAR.  Many fans were ready to have him come up after his breakout minor league year last year.  He got off to a terrible start, outside of a couple of hits, he was auto out.  Then he was sent down for a day, because of injury came back up.  He did not play a game in AAA during that short stint and now has improved a ton numbers wise.  At his lowest he was hitting .094/.143/.332.  Yes it was very short sample size.  We were not calling him a bust, but clearly not ready for MLB action.  That was just hitting but fielding was just as bad. 

Since that time, he has played just over 30 games.  In his last 30 games he is hitting .308/.337/.853.  We gave him about 14 games of terrible hitting before he was sent down.  Now about 30 games since coming back he is doing pretty well.  Now if he goes back to the first 14 games, how long before he gets sent back down, or we stop finding playing time for him?  

It is similar with Vets.  Some guys will have long term success, but then have a few years of sub performance, but yet they keep getting chances.  I am guessing most people will give a guy that had seasons of success much more slack, than someone who had just 1 season.  Look at Baddoo.  Last year he was a good rookie and people were thinking he would be cornerstone for Tigers going forward.  17 games this year and a -0.6 WAR he was sent down.  He is doing well in AAA overall, and most likely will return, but how much slack will he get back in the majors?  Will people look at his rookie year and give him slack again, or will they look at his follow up start to the year?  Even in his rookie year he had long stretches of good and bad.  

Baseball has always been ups and downs for players.  I just always wonder how long before teams and fans turn on a guy for good or bad. 

[Nine of twelve]

I appreciate that this was not intended to be about any player in particular. But the question can be answered only about each player in particular.

[Trov]

10 minutes ago, Nine of twelve said:

I appreciate that this was not intended to be about any player in particular. But the question can be answered only about each player in particular.

I was mainly trying to get people to really think on things.  I do not expect any actual answer but more of something to think for themselves.  We tend to be in a new thought process with wanting results right away, and a reaction to the moment, unless a guy has a long track record, and even then we sometimes are quick to cast them as finished. 

[Dman]

Honestly I think every situation is different.  You look at last year and the Twins stuck with Simmons no matter how bad his bat was.  So I think the situations are different for veterans versus Rookies.

In general my feeling is that Rookies generally get less leeway at the MLB level because they have never proven what they can do at the MLB level.  They are an unknown when they first come up.  Not every player makes it so if they struggle you can only give them so much time to figure things out.

First the team can't afford to give away many bad at bats and second if an unproven player is getting schooled at the MLB level probably better to send him down and have him work on the weaknesses teams have found to get him out.  Yes Rookies need to time to adjust but at the same time if they are not preforming relatively quickly they can't keep a black hole bat in the lineup for long.  So I can see why Rookies get the hook relatively early.  

Veterans are veterans because they have had proven success at the Big league level.  They have a known track record so teams better know what to expect.  Granted the numbers change every year but veterans usually get a very long leash based on prior performance.  Eventually every vet comes to the end of the road.  They can only be bad for so long before they get axed as well.  

I know Ideally at least for Rookies teams like to give them a certain number of at bats to get a chance to adjust but a team like the Twins looking for a playoff spot is going to have a shorter leash than teams that are pretty much out of it. 

IMO I think it is very situationally based.  So every situation is different.

[Old fox]

If & when a player is sent down and never makes it back to the mlb because the player called up as a fill in player takes hold and does very well. No 2 players are alike and may react differently to a stimulus and timelines may very a great of the time.

[bean5302]

1. Between 2/3 "bad" years in a row in the minors, depending on level/experience.
Keoni Cavaco was the first round pick in 2019, but after he struggled again in his second season of 2021, it was pretty obvious he was way behind the 8 ball. He struggled to open this season as well and it's time to consider him a bust.

2. Over age 25-26 still in the minors.
Brent Rooker is a really good exercise in this, IMHO. He's been written off completely at this point. He's age 27 and the Padres haven't played him in a single game. Rooker's advanced metrics were pretty positive last year despite the poor production, but it's not good enough to get him playing time even though he's OPS'ing .950. He's been written off.

3. At the MLB level it's harder. 2 consecutive years of 200ish PA or 50+ innings reliever/starter  "bad"
a. Jake Cave falls into the first example. 2020 = 123 PA .221/.285/.389, 2021 = 178 PA .189/.249/.293. The underlying metrics were rough both years as well, but add in Cave's miserable performance overall at AAA from 2021 and it was enough.
b. Lewis Thorpe falls into the second example. Used primarily in relief, Thorpe was bad in 2019 (27 innings), 2020 (16 innings) and 2021 (15 innings). When he wasn't immediately impressive out of the gate, the Twins just plain released him this year. Despite the lower innings total per season, the Twins had seen enough by 70 innings or so.

Some guidelines from my perspective. Depends on what you think of as "bad" when advanced metrics and how the player looks in person comes into consideration.

 

 

 

 

[ashbury]

3 hours ago, Trov said:

For example, just this year, Jose Miranda, a rookie, has put up a -0.5 WAR.  Many fans were ready to have him come up after his breakout minor league year last year.  He got off to a terrible start, outside of a couple of hits, he was auto out.  Then he was sent down for a day, because of injury came back up.  He did not play a game in AAA during that short stint and now has improved a ton numbers wise.  At his lowest he was hitting .094/.143/.332.  Yes it was very short sample size.  We were not calling him a bust, but clearly not ready for MLB action.  That was just hitting but fielding was just as bad. 

Since that time, he has played just over 30 games.  In his last 30 games he is hitting .308/.337/.853.  We gave him about 14 games of terrible hitting before he was sent down.  Now about 30 games since coming back he is doing pretty well.  Now if he goes back to the first 14 games, how long before he gets sent back down, or we stop finding playing time for him?

Miranda's a good case study, even if not the primary subject/target of the post.  In that .332 OPS stretch of the season, there was an indicator that many will pooh pooh, but in retrospect looks like was a reason for hope.  His Batting Average on Balls In Play was an incredibly low .098 during that time.  You need additional input, such as exit velocity of the ball off his bat, or simply a coach's eye test, to validate that such a low BABIP wasn't simply a beer-league softball player called up by mistake.  But whether you choose to call it luck or merely unsustainably bad performance, there was reason to think that base hits would start falling in for him like for any competent hitter, and his numbers should come up.  His BABIP did indeed rise to customary levels, and we see the results.

So no, 56 plate appearances was not enough in the case of Miranda. 

It wouldn't have been enough, if his results had been stellar, either, but we often fail to look that gift horse in the mouth.  Frankly we're seeing the same thing now with Gilberto Celestino but in the wrong direction, with an incredibly hot month of May supported by a BABIP through the roof that you just knew couldn't hold up in the long run, and now his production has come back down although it's disguised by his season numbers still looking good enough.  His sustainable performance looks like he would benefit from some more time at AAA except we need his glove to cover CF.

Tom Kelly had this rule of thumb of 1000 plate appearances to know whether you've really got something, when a player is going well.  That is the opposite question of what you asked, of course, but goes to show just how long it can take for the coach/evaluator's best guess to bear out with results.  1000 probably is overkill when a guy is going bad but illustrates the problem, if a knowledgeable guy like Kelly said it.

The question is important in both directions.

[ashbury]

1 hour ago, bean5302 said:

1. Between 2/3 "bad" years in a row in the minors, depending on level/experience.
Keoni Cavaco was the first round pick in 2019, but after he struggled again in his second season of 2021, it was pretty obvious he was way behind the 8 ball. He struggled to open this season as well and it's time to consider him a bust.

2. Over age 25-26 still in the minors.
Brent Rooker is a really good exercise in this, IMHO. He's been written off completely at this point. He's age 27 and the Padres haven't played him in a single game. Rooker's advanced metrics were pretty positive last year despite the poor production, but it's not good enough to get him playing time even though he's OPS'ing .950. He's been written off.

3. At the MLB level it's harder. 2 consecutive years of 200ish PA or 50+ innings reliever/starter  "bad"
a. Jake Cave falls into the first example. 2020 = 123 PA .221/.285/.389, 2021 = 178 PA .189/.249/.293. The underlying metrics were rough both years as well, but add in Cave's miserable performance overall at AAA from 2021 and it was enough.
b. Lewis Thorpe falls into the second example. Used primarily in relief, Thorpe was bad in 2019 (27 innings), 2020 (16 innings) and 2021 (15 innings). When he wasn't immediately impressive out of the gate, the Twins just plain released him this year. Despite the lower innings total per season, the Twins had seen enough by 70 innings or so.

Some guidelines from my perspective. Depends on what you think of as "bad" when advanced metrics and how the player looks in person comes into consideration.

 

 

 

 

Good observations all, with some provisos for each.

Cavaco is a tough case because he only turned 21 last month.   It's still more about projection than actual results at that age, and if there's any promise in a player at all I want to see what he looks like at age 23 or later.   His production at low-A this year is mediocre, yet an improvement over last year at the same level.  Could be just a late bloomer with that bat, and I'd be inclined toward patience, trusting that the draft evaluators saw something real.  Except... he's been switched from SS to 3B this year and still has a very high error rate,  Errors aren't everything, but beyond a certain amount of them it does become worrisome, and a .900 fielding percentage for a 3rd baseman is pretty darn low.  So it's not just the bat in a vacuum.  If the bat develops but never turns into a real plus, and he starts to look like a fielder without a position... whew, the leash does start to get a bit short.  The thing is, it doesn't really cost anything significant to keep him around and see whether he develops.  But he may never be worth a 40-man roster spot, and if someone offered anything of measurable value for him in trade now, I might say yes.

I won't wax eloquent on each of the others, but there is plenty to chew on.  Hard and fast numbers are dangerous, more so the younger they are, but the benchmarks you suggested have merit.

[Riverbrian]

I don't believe there is X number of AB's or a specific X period of time. 

I think its a process of pulling from the bottom when roster decisions are forced.

Is the player near a chair when the music stops. 

 

[wsnydes]

As others have said, it's really dependent on the individual player.  And even then, there are so many factors that it's hard to really condense that down into any sort of "rule of thumb" process.

I like the question though.  Good talker, good subject matter to think through.

[ChermesZ]

It probably comes down to several factors:

Is the player a prospect and needs to see AB's?

How are the peripheral #'s for the player?

What is the team's investment in the player?

What is the consistency of the #'s?  

How many years of control does that player have (or options left)?

I wonder how it works with pitchers?  I see Robles was let go from Boston recently.

[big dog]

Two other factors that matter on a case-by-case basis:

- what options does the team have; do we need to keep running someone out there, even if he's failing, because we have no real alternative at the moment? You are more likely to give up on someone if you have a potentially better (or at least different) option.

- the same is true for 40-man roster management. If we let Player X be unprotected, that's partly a function of who we want to protect instead. We may not have given up on Wells or Baddoo, but we chose to put other people higher on the priority list. Maybe that's not giving up on them, but it certainly isn't fully believing in them.

Things like draft position are sunk costs that might unfortunately influence team decisions. How long would Tyler Jay have lasted in the minors if he hadn't been a first round pick? You can certainly argue that the pick measured potential, and players with more potential deserve a longer leash, but I think there's a mental factor that makes teams hang on longer than they should in some cases.

 

[old nurse]

Depends on what you have to replace the player with.  Last year’s tryouts for the bullpen were relatively short. Minor league players get to play until the draftee signs. The end of the season starts a merry go round of movement  Left handed pitchers get a chance somewhere until their arm falls off

[Blyleven2011]

It's baby steps these days in baseball with players , rookies or veterans  ...

Arraez has only been the exception  since 2019 and he has sparked the team with his ability to hit and get on base ,,,  It usually takes 3 years to evaluate the true performance your going to get from a player on a daily basis  .... Arraez again is the exception  I knew he was a major leaguer after 2 to 3 months in the league in 2019  ,,, Lewis might have been the exception this year but we will have to wait until next year ( big disappointment ).....

Polanco was another decent player coming up and he had talent  but it took a couple of years to know exactly who he was going to be ....  

Dozier took 3 years to know  what kind of player he was going to be , 250 hitter , great defense at secondbase with power .... strikeouts sucked ..... 

I know I'm off the subject but just wanted to share  my thoughts 

[Bigfork Twins Guy]

One other item to consider is where the team is at.  If it is a playoff team like this year, you may not have the patience to wait for a player to come around.  If it is a poor year like last year, you can afford to give players, especially rookies, more time to develop since this is little to nothing to lose.

[Riverbrian]

I was sitting at a bar when a horse walked in. 

Bartender: "Why the Long Face"? 

Horse: "We adapt to our environment through natural selection. The long face makes it easier to reach the grass and it's easier to spot predators while dining and over time we end up with long faces". 

Riverbrian: "Major league front offices often times ignore natural selection by selecting which players will get opportunity after opportunity to fail until they survive while others get no such opportunity".    

Horse and Bartender in Unison: "What the Hell are you talking about"? 

Riverbrian: (Looking at the Horse) "How did you learn to talk"? 

Riverbrian: (Looking at the Bartender) "I've had enough to drink"!