The Twins Are Making High-Stakes Bets on Their 2023 Bullpen

[Cris E]

Pagan has some sketchy command. On the one hand he tends to walk guys, but on the other he gets strikeouts, but on the other he gives up home runs. The thing is he was erratic all season with several good months and several poor ones, and it wasn't a clean first half second half thing either: his monthly ERA went 3.18, 1.59, 11.42, 3.48, 5.40 and 2.25. The 84 K were nice, but the killer was 12 HR and 26 BB  in 63 IP.  There were eleven games last year where Emilio gave up multiple runs: five were in June (including four games in eight days!) and four times in August (including a couple against the Dodgers.) He'd been getting far better results than he deserved going into those June Guardians games so it wasn't any surprise that the roof fell in, but he was quite a bit cleaner as the season went on.  Overall he pitched more against CLE than anyone else and had terrible results: 10 games (of 59) yielding 11 ER (of 31) in 10 IP (of 63), which was more than unfortunate. Maybe next year they hold him out of some of those appearances? We'll see.

[DocBauer]

I don't fault the Twins philosophy in building a pen. You make trades, you convert starters that have stuff but don't fit the rotation role, and you take fliers on guys that maybe haven't "found it" yet, or had it before and might find it again. You work for the best back end 3 or 4 you can find and mix and match different options for the middle.

(I think poor middle relief was a major issue in 2022).

I really like the potential of this pen and don't think it's any kind of crazy stretch to seeing them being very good. And there are a lot of arms to help out and roll through as necessary, including a couple not even on the current 40 man.

My issue is that while PAYING for a previously good RP guarantees zero, I simply wouldn't have trusted keeping Pagan around based on a SSS of low leverage and a new pitch. His removal alone would have freed up a 40 man spot to add another arm that would at least appear to be a more proven, reliable commodity. And when the Twins have done this much, spent this much, come this far, I just feel like they pulled up with a cramp while rounding 3rd and headed for home.

Chaffin, Moore, and there were/are others, would cost $ but that one more arm wouldn't destroy payroll. And that one more arm might flame out and have a bad year. (See Addison Reed). But the risk would be worth the reward, IMO, to potentially deepen that back end, and overall depth. Moore or Chaffin instead of Pagan for a difference of $4-5M or so more than his $3.5M? I'd make that move EVERY DAY. 

And the Twins should have.

 

[gunnarthor]

21 hours ago, jmlease1 said:

I forget who was in first place in the division for like 3 months of the season last year? Detroit? No, that was the Twins! This wasn't a bad team last year until everyone got hurt. When you're starting your 10th choice in the OF in September, then there's a problem, but it's not that the team as a whole was bad. (I mean in a critical september series we had to run out cave, celestino, and contreras as the starting OF with Billy hamilton, Jermaine palacios, and Sandy Leon as the bench options. but that was because injuries wiped out everyone)

The twins have not spent on the bullpen because they have rightly seen that the variance in performance often doesn't get you anything when you drop $3-6M  AAV on a guy, and you're often better off finding internal options and sorting through cheaper guys that you can churn if they show they don't have it any longer. That's been the Tampa model: get 3-5 core pieces in your 'pen, and then fill it in more on the fly as you need to, without giving starter money to fungible relievers. Would I have preferred they go sign a guy and replace Pagan? Sure, because I'm worried about sunk cost fallacy and fan PTSD with Pagan and there looked to be guys that were RH options for $3-5M that could have bene trustworthy hands. but overall the bullpen looks pretty good, with some high upside guys in there and few who we're hoping will have a bounce back year.

Thielbar has been very good for 3 years; it's a little silly to question him based on him being out of baseball years ago. Jax had a very successful year as a reliever, there's little reason to think he can't be successful this season. Duran was amazing, and relief seems to be the best way to keep his elbow healthy, not a reason to be more concerned. Moran has control issues, but has an awesome changeup and isn't slated to be a high-leverage guy. Alcala was quality before injury. Lopez might be the biggest question mark (outside of PTSD Pagan), but showed the talent to be an all-star.

There are questions about the bullpen, but you can probably make the same or equally valid questions about every bullpen in baseball. take the ChiSox: their elite closer is going to miss significant time (if not the whole season) because of cancer treatments, their next best reliever (reynaldo lopez) last season just became a full-time reliever in 2022. Their most used reliever last season has had his WPA decline for 3 seasons in a row, and their 2nd most used reliever from last year has had a negative WPA 4 years in a row. neither of these guys (Graveman & Ruiz) have particularly strong peripherals (WHIP of 1.4? That was Tyler Duffey last season and we cut him).

Twins bullpen looks pretty solid.

 

Well, I hope you're right. Really, I do. I'd love to watch playoff baseball. But I think people are ignoring just how bad our staff has been the last few years. Partly, Target Field is a pitcher's park so it helps hide it and partly it's because pitching league wide has really become dominant over hitting the last few years. But this is a really bad staff, it's also old. And a lot of the guys they are counting on have injury and durability issues.

[jmlease1]

28 minutes ago, gunnarthor said:

Well, I hope you're right. Really, I do. I'd love to watch playoff baseball. But I think people are ignoring just how bad our staff has been the last few years. Partly, Target Field is a pitcher's park so it helps hide it and partly it's because pitching league wide has really become dominant over hitting the last few years. But this is a really bad staff, it's also old. And a lot of the guys they are counting on have injury and durability issues.

name names, please. Who on this pitching staff (outside of Pagan) is "really bad"?

But let's contrast to opening day last season: we're looking at 60% of the rotation being different (No Bundy, no Archer, and Ober likely in the minors), and you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who wouldn't say that replacing those three with Mahle, Lopez, and Maeda isn't an improvement. The bullpen has changed as well: no Duffey, no Joe Smith, no Coloumbe, no Cotton, no Romero. the bullpen at the end of last season was more than solid, and that's who they brought back.

It's old? Maeda is 34, Gray is 33. The rest of the starters are like 27, and only get younger after that. Thielbar is old, but Lopez is only 30, even Pagan is only 32. the rest are under 30. (Alcala, Duran, Megill, Jax, & Moran are the most likely to stick in MLB right now) 

Last year's team was right around or just below league average in FIP, ERA+, and ERA. That's not good, but it's also not "really bad". ERA+ is adjusted for park effects; league average was 101, the twins were 98. League average in FIP was 3.97, Twins were 4.03. League ERA was 3.96, Twins were 3.98. Really bad are teams like the Pirates or Royals. the Twins were in the middle third of the league last year, and their pitching should be better...even if they get hit with an injury bug again.

 

[Doctor Gast]

"a certain reliever melting down several times in close games against a division rival lingers in memory more starkly than, say, the offense that couldn't build a sufficient lead, or the starter who couldn't go deep enough to prevent that scenario."

We started the season with a weak rotation of 2 rookies, an unconditioned vet, a weak arm vet, still rehabilitating vet & a broken arm with a horrific BP of unproven arms. And Baldelli's TB formula of heavy dependence on short relief. That's a recipe for disaster.

Of course the BP blew up and of course the SP couldn't take up the slack. From the beginning, a person should have seen that we needed regular long relief to take up the slack. That wasn't done & that contributed to the inefficiency, injuries and loses.  

This season our rotation is much stronger especially with a normal ST & our BP is much deeper, which is conductive to Baldelli type of coaching But as Nick mentioned that there are questions. I have my doubts like how efficient & how long Maeda will be able to pitch, how Alcala will come back and there is the unexpected injuries. Even though it's imperative that we have long relief to cover any extra innings so not to overtask our short RPs & SP.  

[ashbury]

On 2/13/2023 at 9:28 AM, Cris E said:

Pagan has some sketchy command. On the one hand he tends to walk guys, but on the other he gets strikeouts, but on the other he gives up home runs. The thing is he was erratic all season with several good months and several poor ones, and it wasn't a clean first half second half thing either: his monthly ERA went 3.18, 1.59, 11.42, 3.48, 5.40 and 2.25.

Runs are what matter, but ERA isn't a very reliable measure for a reliever.  Looking at OPS-against tells more about the guy's game, and Pagan's OPS by month were .796, .767, .819, .718, .936, .568.  MLB OPS for the full year was .706.  His monthly numbers still amount to "Small Sample Size" but suggest that he was below average all season, in every month except the last, and was actually pretty lucky in May with regard to letting runners score, and he didn't get the same luck* in June, and it kind of evened out those two months.  He was putting runners on base and letting them hit for power at about the same rate all season, allowing for fluctuations in the tiny 50-plate appearance samples for batters faced in a given month.  September could have been a sign of better things, or might be just fluctuation after a putrid August.  Bottom line is that his .776 OPS for the season was worse than the league as a whole, and we want the relievers we count on to be above average.

Pagan's problem in 2022 isn't that he was erratic, but that he was consistent.

* I don't really believe in luck in sports too much, and usually try for descriptions like "unsustainable," but the overall meaning is close for most purposes.

[joefish]

On 2/12/2023 at 9:06 PM, ashbury said:

Betting is exactly the right word.  And ultimately, the FO it betting on themselves, and their talent evaluation skills.  Like you, I hope they win this overall bet; losing would be costly.

Says every team everywhere. Really. Everybody hopes. Every team. Every coach. Every fan. Every manager. It's a big boat and we are all in it together.

[ashbury]

13 hours ago, joefish said:

Says every team everywhere. Really. Everybody hopes. Every team. Every coach. Every fan. Every manager. It's a big boat and we are all in it together.

I don't blame your reaction.  Going from the date stamp, my post was close to bedtime and I was evidently in too big a hurry to click "submit reply."  Let me try again to give some substance to support the apparent bland post.

I look at this bullpen and ask the FO, "really? You're good with this?  No pieces that could be upgraded?  None at all?"  Obviously every player on the roster is there because of a judgment (or call it a bet) the FO has made.  But it's as if every bullpen candidate reflects a bet made last year or last off-season, at the trading deadline or earlier, and seemingly hasn't been revisited. 

That's not the case with the position players.  Gio Urshela was, to all intents and purposes, replaced by Kyle Farmer.  Gary Sanchez, by Christian Vazquez. Kyle Garlick by Michael A Taylor.  Arraez by...  well, a good starting pitcher and by Joey Gallo somehow - wait and see.  The starting rotation is a different and more complicated story.  But the bullpen?  Everybody I see listed as likely for Opening Day was in the organization at the end of last season.

Just to be clear, I want a bullpen that will not simply let us limp through a regular season, but is a shut-down pen that inspires confidence heading into a post-season series, hopefully through more than one series as long as I'm wishing.  Jhoan Duran is the no-brainer in this collection, by consensus.  Thielbar makes me nervous that midnight will strike and he'll turn back into a pumpkin but he does have a defined role and seems able to fill it (or could be replaced pretty easily in-season if need be).  I'm not sold on Jax yet as more than "just a guy," but he did construct a good record in 2022 and if it's not a mirage then he might be part of the solution.  All the others?  The FO evidently thinks "he is capable of more than he's shown," or else more specifically "he will overcome the injury bug," such as Alcala. 

I don't blame the FO for acquiring Emilio Pagan as a throw-in when they acquired Chris Paddack for Taylor Rogers, if they saw something they liked and something they could thought they could fix.  But Pagan followed up a below-par 2021 for the Padres with a similarly uninspiring 2022 with the Twins.  Can our FO really believe they will still unlock excellence that past pitching coaches, including now our own, have failed to find?  He turns 31 in a couple of months, and probably is who he is. (I'd say he already was who he is, when we got him.)

I don't blame the FO for acquiring Jorge Lopez at the deadline, though his record of dominance screamed "small sample size" and  I wish they could have paid less to give him a try.  He turned 30 a few days ago and I suspect he also "is who he is."  Competent reliever? Probably? Shut-down guy? No, I don't think that's what we wound up getting in trade.

Trevor Megill?  I don't blame... oh please.  The fascination with his toolsy stuff should be over with by now.  We're his third organization. He's 29.  Same comments as the other two above.

There are some younger guys who may have ceilings that offer genuine hope of excellence and I'm not going to dive further down this rabbit hole.  But the above 3 names are to me clear candidates for improvement, and instead the FO seems to be going with their previous talent assessments that brought these arms into the organization in the first place.

Coming back to the theme of placing bets, then, I wanted at first to say that the FO is "doubling down" on their bullpen bets from last off-season and thereafter.  But I think that's not quite right - Falvey hasn't said, "Megill? He's our closer!" - and it's more like they are "standing pat" with the hand they hold.  They could still discard a few low cards and draw again, but unless there is a move in the works (for when a couple of players can be stashed on the 60-day IL), they've decided not to.

I have concerns about the offense too, but if everything comes together this year for a competitive squad, it's the bullpen that could prove to be the weak spot yet again.  And I'm perplexed that it's the one area of the roster they didn't address.  "Nah, we're good with what we've got" is as much of a bet the FO is placing on their own acumen from a year ago, and/or their vaunted Pitching Pipeline™, as it is on any of the individual cases among these players.  I sincerely hope they win this bet, but there's reason to worry they won't.