Game Thread 9-4-22 @ 1:10pm CT: Twins vs White Sox

[IndianaTwin]

Welcome to the Stopper Edition of the Twins Daily Game Thread series, as Dylan Bundy takes to the hill to face Lucas Giolito in a game the Twins badly need. After a truly masterful performance (and it pains me to say this about any Team That Shall Not Be Named player, but it truly was masterful) by Dylan Cease, the afore-referenced-but-not-named team has climbed within a game of our Twins, who trail a recently renamed, but still disliked, team by a single game. Should all things turn out well today, our Twins will exit the weekend tied for first and three games up on the third-place team. 

Usually when I write a Game Thread edition, I try to come up with a witty theme. I'm not feeling it today, however. I even skipped church to go on a long bike ride, hoping for inspiration. As it turns out, the only thing on the bike ride that made me think of today's game was a few fresh steaming hot road apples left behind as I rode through the local Amish country. Said road apples reminded me both of my dislike for today's opponents and of the way the Twins have played in the most recent 11 innings. 

 

With Bundy on the hill, I can already hear the "oh, no, here comes another short start" comments. I'm going to try to nip this in the bud by offering a different perspective. 

I don't think short starts was the plan for this year. First, a few weeks ago, I went back to some prior year stats to see how Rocco has handled pitchers. What I found was this: 

 

So yes, in four of the past five years, Twins starters have gone shorter than the major league average, but in three of those years it was negligible. For context, each 0.1 essentially means that they have to get 16 2/10 more innings out of their bullpen over the course of the year, compared to the average team. Digging deeper, the 2019 season deserves as asterisk. If you remember, that was the year the Twins flirted with using openers. Without digging deeply, I found eight games where they used an opener. Take out those, and their average start was 5.3 innings, again a negligible difference. And in 2019, buoyed by healthy veterans Berrios, Odorizzi, Perez, Pineda and Gibson, they averaged 0.3 innings per start more than the league average. In total, over those five years have seen the Twins average 0.5 fewer innings per start than their opponents, which works out to about 8 innings over the course of a season. To me, this suggests that "shorter starts" is not a longstanding strategy for the Twins. 

But this year has seemed different. In fact, during last night's game, they showed a graphic noting that the Twins rank 27th in MLB in innings per start, getting just 4.8  innings per start compared to the league average of 5.2. Should that continue, it would be the biggest difference they've had in the six years since Falvey and Levine have been on board. 

But here's where I'm going to suggest that that wasn't the plan. 

Let's separate the season into three chunks. The first will be April 8-May 30. The Twins started the season with starters Ryan, Gray, Ober, Bundy, Archer and Paddack, four veterans and two relievers. Though not in the original rotation, Smeltzer and Winder would get starts in that period. During that period, it appears that Rocco (I'm going to use "Rocco" as a catchall term for management, since we really don't know who all plays into these decisions) tried to use the starters in a conventional way. For example: 

• In Ryan's first eight starts, he went about 5.4 innings per start, with four of them going at least 6 innings. 
• Gray got a late start, but in his last three starts in that stretch, went 6, 7 and 6 innings.
• Ober ended up with only six starts in that period, but his first three were 5, 6 and 5, before getting shelled and pulled after 3.2, sent to the minors as the Twins went with other veterans, and then returning with a 5 inning start.
• Bundy went an average of 5.0 innings in his first eight starts, but that counts getting pulled at 3.2 in a game he got shelled and then at 3 innings after a short IL stint. He had two games of 6.0 innings in that mix.
• Winder went 6 and 6 innings in his first two starts, but then 3.1 and 3.2 in games he got shelled. 
• Smeltzer only had four starts, and they were mixed in with some relief appearances, so it's hard to see a pattern. 
• Coming off injury, Paddack pitched 20 innings in his first four starts, going 4, 5, 5.2 and 5.1 before getting hurt. It looks like an effort to longer ("normal") starts was developing.
• Archer was the exception, averaging just under 4 innings per start, but it's worth noting that he was the only pitcher to not miss a start in that time period. 

When one considers the short spring training, the beginning of the season (when starts are shorter across the board as guys continue to get lengthened) and the expanded bullpen, I think Rocco was planning to use his starters in a "normal" pattern. 

But guess what, guys got hurt. As noted, only Archer avoided a stint on the IL, and on May 30, a bunch of those guys were there.

That leads to the next window of time, from May 31-June 12. In those 13 games, our starters included Smeltzer (3 times), Sands (3), Archer (2), Chi Chi Gonzalez (2), Bundy (2) and Ober (1). I don't think that's what Rocco was planning for as his rotation. To summarize, that's a starter coming off a crappy season (Bundy), a guy coming off several years of injury (Archer), a minor league signing (Gonzalez), an unproven young guy (Smeltzer) and two guys (Ober and Sands) with only a handful of career starts each. 

I think it was during that time that Rocco pivoted, making the decision to shorten up the starts a bit as an attempt to keep guys healthy. And has it worked? Well, from June 13, here are the number of starts the rotation guys have had in the 69 games of that stretch: 

• Ryan 14
• Bundy 13
• Gray 15
• Archer 12 (Note: Archer hasn't "missed" starts, 
• And a fifth spot shared by Smeltzer (6), Mahle (4), Winder (3) and Sanchez (3).

I think the strategy has worked, at least in terms of health. We might argue about effectiveness, but the reality is that during most of that time, the guys we had in the minors were hardly being lights out, so it's been important to keep these guys healthy. I'm sure there were times along the way when Rocco would have liked to try nudging another inning or two out of people, but it's been clear to me that he always has taken the long view, making sure that long IL stints are avoided. (And I'd add that in my mind, "taking the long view" really encapsulates most of the decisions the front office has made. That gets irritating on a day-to-day basis, but it fits with the notion of "sustainability." But that's another discussion.)

As to starts per inning, and this is where I'm going to circle back to Bundy in particular. I'd done some totaling a week or so ago when I was starting to develop this thesis, so these are a few days out of date. Perhaps during today's game, I'll take the time to update, but from June 13 to a week or so ago, Gray averaged 5.1 innings and Ryan and Bundy have each averaged 5.24, so Bundy has been going as long as anyone (and matching the league average).

In the interest of beating starting time, I'm going to post this now, but I'll add some updated data in the comments. 

And now, back to today's regularly scheduled game. Here's the lineups: 

Minnesota Twins

1. Luis Arraez (L), 1b
2. Carlos Correa (R), ss
3. Jose Miranda (R), DH
4. Max Kepler (L), RF
5. Gio Urshela (R), 3b
6. Kyle Garlick (R), lf
7. Nick Gordon (L), 2b
8. Gary Sanchez (R), c
9. Gilberto Celestino (R), cf
-- Dylan Bundy (R), p

 

The Other Team

1. Elvis Andrus (R), ss
2. Andrew Vaughn (R), lf
3. Jose Abreu (R), 1b
4. Eloy Jimenez (R), dh
5. Gavin Sheets (L), rf
6. Yasmani Grandal (S), C
7. A.J. Pollock (R), cf
8. Leury Garcia (S), 3b
9. Romy Gonzalez (R), 2b
-- Lucas Giolito (R), p

 

 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Did we win yet?

[IndianaTwin]

Here's the stats since June 13 for the four primary starters. By both ERA and FIP, Bundy and Gray have been the most effective during that time, though Ryan has gone a little longer. 

Chris Archer (4,28 innings per start)

(Also, of note, during the 13 game "transition" period I describe in the GT intro, Archer's starts were both 5 innings. It looks like the goal is to get to 5 innings, but pitch count and game situation determines what happens in the fifth inning. He's made it through 5 five times, been pulled during the fifth on four occasions, and pulled after 4 in 11 games, almost always with pitch counts in the 60s and 70s. The one time he went 90 pitches was immediately followed by an IL stint, so I'm guessing that contributed to their backing down on his innings.)

 

Dylan Bundy (now 5.18 innings per start): 

 

Sonny Gray (5.07 innings per start)

Joe Ryan (5.36 innings per start)

 

 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Play ball, by the way...

 

(i am doing something else, so i only get to chime in snarkily.... from time to time)

[Game7-91]

15 minutes ago, IndianaTwin said:

Here's the stats since June 13 for the four primary starters. By both ERA and FIP, Bundy and Gray have been the most effective during that time, though Ryan has gone a little longer. 

Chris Archer (4,28 innings per start)

(Also, of note, during the 13 game "transition" period I describe in the GT intro, Archer's starts were both 5 innings. It looks like the goal is to get to 5 innings, but pitch count and game situation determines what happens in the fifth inning. He's made it through 5 five times, been pulled during the fifth on four occasions, and pulled after 4 in 11 games, almost always with pitch counts in the 60s and 70s. The one time he went 90 pitches was immediately followed by an IL stint, so I'm guessing that contributed to their backing down on his innings.)

 

Dylan Bundy (now 5.18 innings per start): 

 

Sonny Gray (5.07 innings per start)

 

Joe Ryan (5.36 innings per start)

 

Excellent material Ind Twin! It's a compelling argument that what we've been seeing is an adjustment to roster churn. At the same time, its apparent MLB as a whole has moved to shorten starts, Twins are not an outlier.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Bundy's no hitter is still intact...

[tony&rodney]

The AL Central is limping right now. Who will emerge?

[mrtwinsfan]

No No No.s today

[IndianaTwin]

Benetti does college football, so Len Kasper is covering for him on their broadcast. After making the obligatory “Jose Miranda is a cousin of Lin Manuel” comment, Kasper noted that as a result, the Twins have been adding Hamiltons to their roster with Caleb and Billy. 

 

[USAFChief]

1 hour ago, IndianaTwin said:

Welcome to the Stopper Edition of the Twins Daily Game Thread series, as Dylan Bundy takes to the hill to face Lucas Giolito in a game the Twins badly need. After a truly masterful performance (and it pains me to say this about any Team That Shall Not Be Named player, but it truly was masterful) by Dylan Cease, the afore-referenced-but-not-named team has climbed within a game of our Twins, who trail a recently renamed, but still disliked, team by a single game. Should all things turn out well today, our Twins will exit the weekend tied for first and three games up on the third-place team. 

Usually when I write a Game Thread edition, I try to come up with a witty theme. I'm not feeling it today, however. I even skipped church to go on a long bike ride, hoping for inspiration. As it turns out, the only thing on the bike ride that made me think of today's game was a few fresh steaming hot road apples left behind as I rode through the local Amish country. Said road apples reminded me both of my dislike for today's opponents and of the way the Twins have played in the most recent 11 innings. 

 

With Bundy on the hill, I can already hear the "oh, no, here comes another short start" comments. I'm going to try to nip this in the bud by offering a different perspective. 

I don't think short starts was the plan for this year. First, a few weeks ago, I went back to some prior year stats to see how Rocco has handled pitchers. What I found was this: 

 

So yes, in four of the past five years, Twins starters have gone shorter than the major league average, but in three of those years it was negligible. For context, each 0.1 essentially means that they have to get 16 2/10 more innings out of their bullpen over the course of the year, compared to the average team. Digging deeper, the 2019 season deserves as asterisk. If you remember, that was the year the Twins flirted with using openers. Without digging deeply, I found eight games where they used an opener. Take out those, and their average start was 5.3 innings, again a negligible difference. And in 2019, buoyed by healthy veterans Berrios, Odorizzi, Perez, Pineda and Gibson, they averaged 0.3 innings per start more than the league average. In total, over those five years have seen the Twins average 0.5 fewer innings per start than their opponents, which works out to about 8 innings over the course of a season. To me, this suggests that "shorter starts" is not a longstanding strategy for the Twins. 

But this year has seemed different. In fact, during last night's game, they showed a graphic noting that the Twins rank 27th in MLB in innings per start, getting just 4.8  innings per start compared to the league average of 5.2. Should that continue, it would be the biggest difference they've had in the six years since Falvey and Levine have been on board. 

But here's where I'm going to suggest that that wasn't the plan. 

Let's separate the season into three chunks. The first will be April 8-May 30. The Twins started the season with starters Ryan, Gray, Ober, Bundy, Archer and Paddack, four veterans and two relievers. Though not in the original rotation, Smeltzer and Winder would get starts in that period. During that period, it appears that Rocco (I'm going to use "Rocco" as a catchall term for management, since we really don't know who all plays into these decisions) tried to use the starters in a conventional way. For example: 

• In Ryan's first eight starts, he went about 5.4 innings per start, with four of them going at least 6 innings. 
• Gray got a late start, but in his last three starts in that stretch, went 6, 7 and 6 innings.
• Ober ended up with only six starts in that period, but his first three were 5, 6 and 5, before getting shelled and pulled after 3.2, sent to the minors as the Twins went with other veterans, and then returning with a 5 inning start.
• Bundy went an average of 5.0 innings in his first eight starts, but that counts getting pulled at 3.2 in a game he got shelled and then at 3 innings after a short IL stint. He had two games of 6.0 innings in that mix.
• Winder went 6 and 6 innings in his first two starts, but then 3.1 and 3.2 in games he got shelled. 
• Smeltzer only had four starts, and they were mixed in with some relief appearances, so it's hard to see a pattern. 
• Coming off injury, Paddack pitched 20 innings in his first four starts, going 4, 5, 5.2 and 5.1 before getting hurt. It looks like an effort to longer ("normal") starts was developing.
• Archer was the exception, averaging just under 4 innings per start, but it's worth noting that he was the only pitcher to not miss a start in that time period. 

When one considers the short spring training, the beginning of the season (when starts are shorter across the board as guys continue to get lengthened) and the expanded bullpen, I think Rocco was planning to use his starters in a "normal" pattern. 

But guess what, guys got hurt. As noted, only Archer avoided a stint on the IL, and on May 30, a bunch of those guys were there.

That leads to the next window of time, from May 31-June 12. In those 13 games, our starters included Smeltzer (3 times), Sands (3), Archer (2), Chi Chi Gonzalez (2), Bundy (2) and Ober (1). I don't think that's what Rocco was planning for as his rotation. To summarize, that's a starter coming off a crappy season (Bundy), a guy coming off several years of injury (Archer), a minor league signing (Gonzalez), an unproven young guy (Smeltzer) and two guys (Ober and Sands) with only a handful of career starts each. 

I think it was during that time that Rocco pivoted, making the decision to shorten up the starts a bit as an attempt to keep guys healthy. And has it worked? Well, from June 13, here are the number of starts the rotation guys have had in the 69 games of that stretch: 

• Ryan 14
• Bundy 13
• Gray 15
• Archer 12 (Note: Archer hasn't "missed" starts, 
• And a fifth spot shared by Smeltzer (6), Mahle (4), Winder (3) and Sanchez (3).

I think the strategy has worked, at least in terms of health. We might argue about effectiveness, but the reality is that during most of that time, the guys we had in the minors were hardly being lights out, so it's been important to keep these guys healthy. I'm sure there were times along the way when Rocco would have liked to try nudging another inning or two out of people, but it's been clear to me that he always has taken the long view, making sure that long IL stints are avoided. (And I'd add that in my mind, "taking the long view" really encapsulates most of the decisions the front office has made. That gets irritating on a day-to-day basis, but it fits with the notion of "sustainability." But that's another discussion.)

As to starts per inning, and this is where I'm going to circle back to Bundy in particular. I'd done some totaling a week or so ago when I was starting to develop this thesis, so these are a few days out of date. Perhaps during today's game, I'll take the time to update, but from June 13 to a week or so ago, Gray averaged 5.1 innings and Ryan and Bundy have each averaged 5.24, so Bundy has been going as long as anyone (and matching the league average).

In the interest of beating starting time, I'm going to post this now, but I'll add some updated data in the comments. 

And now, back to today's regularly scheduled game. Here's the lineups: 

Minnesota Twins

1. Luis Arraez (L), 1b
2. Carlos Correa (R), ss
3. Jose Miranda (R), DH
4. Max Kepler (L), RF
5. Gio Urshela (R), 3b
6. Kyle Garlick (R), lf
7. Nick Gordon (L), 2b
8. Gary Sanchez (R), c
9. Gilberto Celestino (R), cf
-- Dylan Bundy (R), p

 

The Other Team

1. Elvis Andrus (R), ss
2. Andrew Vaughn (R), lf
3. Jose Abreu (R), 1b
4. Eloy Jimenez (R), dh
5. Gavin Sheets (L), rf
6. Yasmani Grandal (S), C
7. A.J. Pollock (R), cf
8. Leury Garcia (S), 3b
9. Romy Gonzalez (R), 2b
-- Lucas Giolito (R), p

 

 

 

[CRF]

All great info, but I can't wrap my brain around all those stats after Rocco's 8th inning stupidity last night. I'm STILL trying to figure that mess out. The only thing I know is...they better get the Twins Titanic turned around fast. They HAVE to somehow win today!

[IndianaTwin]

11 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

 

I figured I’d do it for you, so you didn’t have to. 

[rwilfong86]

I wonder if Bundy goes 5 today?

[IndianaTwin]

Steve Stone the first “expert” who thinks Correa WON’T opt out. 

[rwilfong86]

8 minutes ago, IndianaTwin said:

Steve Stone the first “expert” who thinks Correa WON’T opt out. 

I'm not sure anyone is gonna pay him what he wants with the amount of years he is looking for with the level of production he has put up this season.

[rwilfong86]

Gah this ump is a joke. 2 called strikes that were well outside.

[CRF]

CC!

[rwilfong86]

Correa, 2-0.

[LVTwinsfan]

Is Bremer going senile? There definitely  is a visible black around home plate. He says it’s all white and references the cameras shot of a dirty home plate. Ridiculous.

[RickOShea]

Who cares?  The ump decides how big or small with their calls.

[mrtwinsfan]

Here we go again ,  Bundy has looked great for 5,  Now What ????, see jax getting loose

[rwilfong86]

It looks like Seattle is up 2-1 now against Cleveland, in a rain delay. Let's hope the current situations hold.

 

[mrtwinsfan]

8 minutes ago, LVTwinsfan said:

Is Bremer going senile? There definitely  is a visible black around home plate. He says it’s all white and references the cameras shot of a dirty home plate. Ridiculous.

Twice  he has said Max has a broken leg

[IndyTwinsFan]

53 minutes ago, rwilfong86 said:

I wonder if Bundy goes 5 today?

I clearly don't know if he will, but I think that through 5 innings, he certainly deserves the opportunity to at least start the 6th inning, number of times through the order notwithstanding. 

[rwilfong86]

Caveman digging for 3

[rwilfong86]

Just now, IndyTwinsFan said:

I clearly don't know if he will, but I think that through 5 innings, he certainly deserves the opportunity to at least start the 6th inning, number of times through the order notwithstanding. 

If Cave scores here and makes it 3-0, they should definitely let Bundy start the 6th. 

[RickOShea]

And we all know that it's Kepler's  head that has the problem.

[Twins_Fan_For_Life]

Vaughn is brutal in the  outfield 

[RickOShea]

Just now, rwilfong86 said:

If Cave scores here and makes it 3-0, they should definitely let Bundy start the 6th. 

Your sarcasm is first class!

[IndyTwinsFan]

4 minutes ago, mrtwinsfan said:

Here we go again ,  Bundy has looked great for 5,  Now What ????, see jax getting loose

I say send him back out to at least start the 6th.  I think he's earned it today.