How much would Nolasco and 2nd pitcher affected our staff in 2013 and 2014.

[Brandon]

Stats from which are shown in first comment as I couldn't post in the story because they took up too much space. http://espn.go.com/mlb/stats/team/_/stat/pitching/year/2013/seasontype/2/league/al

In 2013 the Twins ranked at the bottom of the AmericanLeague in ERA. For 2014 we just signed a200 inning pitcher likely to have an ERA in the high 3.00’s maybe 4.00 how will that affect our pitching going into next year and how much will having a 2^ndpitcher such as Capuano if not Garza affect the staff as well? Signing the first pitcher was HUGE. Last year we had 30 starts go to DeVries, Hernandez, Walters, and Hendriks for a combined total of innings 158.33 innings with 123 earned runs allowed. I know that there would likely have been a few spot starts with these guys this year and there were a few games they played well in, however replacing that production with the production of a pitcher who gave up 82 runs in 199 innings will end up up saving the team approximately 50-60 earned runs off of the total team ERA.

 

With the 2^ndpitcher it becomes a little harder to determine the effect without diving into different points of the season when decisions could be made such as would theTwins pulled the plug on Pelfry earlier with these 2 new pitchers on the staffas well? How many starts would Gibson receivedas bad as he pitched last year? How manystarts would Diamond have received? (remember he started off the same as lastyear through 5 starts then went down hill). I am guestimating that we would have saved another 20 – 30 runs even with Capuano starting over what we had last year (assuming 165 innings and 4.00ERA). (This would be a fun debatable point) That would have had the team giving up 643 – 663 earned runs in approx. 1450 innings for an ERA around 3.99 to 4.12. We would be just shy of having a 90 win potential pitching staff as Cleveland had the highest team ERA at 3.82 for 90 game winning teams. With Deduno likely to get more than 160 innings this year if his arm holds up and improvements from Gibson and the arrival of Meyer at some point next year and a bullpen that is not over taxed with reinforcements (numerous arms available inAAA) if necessary. Also I don’t know much about Johnson (the pitcher acquired from Pittsburgh a week or so ago) but I would rather he be our 6^th/7^th starter who gets calledup for spot starts with his 90+ fastball over Walters and his 88-89 mph fastball. I suspect we will likely have that pitching staff next season that can allow us to win 90 games if our offense produces enough to get us there. We scored only 614 runs last season good for 14th place in the AL. And that looks to be our big question fornext season once Terry Ryan finishes with the pitching staff.

[Brandon]

[TABLE]

RK

TEAM

W

L

ERA

IP

QS

ER

R

BB

SO

1

Kansas City

86

76

3.45

1448.1

95

555

601

469

1208

2

Oakland

96

66

3.56

1452.0

92

574

625

428

1183

3

Detroit

93

69

3.61

1462.2

108

587

624

462

1428

4

Texas

91

72

3.62

1463.1

77

589

636

498

1309

5

Tampa Bay

92

71

3.74

1464.0

80

608

646

482

1310

6

Boston

97

65

3.79

1454.0

95

613

656

524

1294

7

Cleveland

92

70

3.82

1441.1

73

611

662

554

1379

8

NY Yankees

85

77

3.94

1447.1

84

633

671

437

1233

9

Chicago Sox

63

99

3.98

1455.0

90

643

723

509

1249

10

Baltimore

85

77

4.20

1453.0

78

678

709

473

1169

11

LA Angels

78

84

4.23

1457.2

87

685

737

533

1200

12

Toronto

74

88

4.25

1452.0

67

685

756

500

1208

13

Seattle

71

91

4.31

1465.0

83

702

754

478

1297

14

Minnesota

66

96

4.55

1450.1

62

733

788

458

985

15

Houston

51

111

4.79

1440.0

75

766

848

616

1084

[/TABLE]

[Thrylos]

Revisionist history and what ifs are dangerous. The answer is that no one can predict what Nolasco could have done for the Twins last season. He could have blown his arm in Spring Training without pitching an inning. (see: Harden, Richard)

 

He is a great addition for 2014 for sure. Now need 2 more SPs, and especially one LHP, so that the likes of Diamond and Albers pitch were they belong (AAA).

 

Calling for 90 games is pretty premature. The 2013 team could have won 90, if Worley pitched the way he pitched in Philly, Harden was back and healthy Diamond, Willingham and Plouffe played like it was 2012, Morneau played like it was the first half of 2010 etc etc etc. Lots of ifs, but...

[snepp]

For 2014 we just signed a200 inning pitcher likely to have an ERA in the high 3.00’s maybe 4.00

 

That's a really optimistic projection given his career. It's likely to be more accurate to say he'll have an ERA in the mid-4's, maybe high 3's.

[John Bonnes]

I haven't checked your math, but I'll use it and throw a bit of back-of-the-napkin figuring.

 

I'll take your word that Nolasco is worth 50-60 runs better than what the Twins trotted out last year. For the sake of argument, let's say the next guy slices off another 30. That's a 80-90 runs against swing.

 

That would have brought the Twins down to about 700 runs against, versus 614 runs they scored. If you do Bill James Pythagorean Expectation on that, you get 70 wins. So there is a lot more needed.

 

It's worth noting that the Twins exceeded their Pythag Expectation by quite a bit last year. According to that, they were a 61 win team. They won 66 games.

[John Bonnes]

By the way, for future reference, a good short-hand is that an extra 10 run per season, whether you score them or give them up, is worth about 1 more win or loss. That certainly played out in this scenario.

[johnnydakota]

I haven't checked your math, but I'll use it and throw a bit of back-of-the-napkin figuring.

 

I'll take your word that Nolasco is worth 50-60 runs better than what the Twins trotted out last year. For the sake of argument, let's say the next guy slices off another 30. That's a 80-90 runs against swing.

 

That would have brought the Twins down to about 700 runs against, versus 614 runs they scored. If you do Bill James Pythagorean Expectation on that, you get 70 wins. So there is a lot more needed.

 

It's worth noting that the Twins exceeded their Pythag Expectation by quite a bit last year. According to that, they were a 61 win team. They won 66 games.

 

wasnt the over and under out of Vegas 64 wins?

[johnnydakota]

Another aspect is the players mentality, Me thinks most game in 2013 , players went into the game hoping not to be blown out by the 3rd inning, having 2-3 veteran starters who are decent lets them go into games with a we got a chance attitude , while that is not great it is an improvement, and for me , thats what I want to see. The Twins Improving

[Rosterman]

With the Twins ERA last season, the team needed to average scoring some 6 runs per game to guarantee a win.

 

It can be that simple.

 

Or the Twins need to score an average of four runs per inning just to protect their starters, who gave up 3-4 runs in their 5-6 innings on the mound. That works if the bullpen is 100% spotless, but most bullpens aren't.

 

The Twins need pitchers that consistently push towards that 7th inning, that keep the team in the game, that can find that extra ounce to shut a team down if you are in the midst of a losing streak. They need more than what they have now, even with Nolasco.

 

You also need typical years from your players. The Twins didn't have that with Willingham. They didn't have it with Morneau. They were hurt with the loss of two centerfielders. Morneau was half the player he usually is. They still struck out too much. There is no lineup construction that guarantees any production. Players weren't protected by other players. The defense was okay at times, miserable at times, young all the time it seemed.

 

Yes, the Twins greatest need is to get that starting ERA back down into the mid-low 4's. But they also have to move runners, drive in runs, and construct a lineup that will do such things well. Not sure Norlasco would've added, by himself, all that much to the team last year. He still might've been the butt of low-scoring.

[Brandon]

I haven't checked your math, but I'll use it and throw a bit of back-of-the-napkin figuring.

 

I'll take your word that Nolasco is worth 50-60 runs better than what the Twins trotted out last year. For the sake of argument, let's say the next guy slices off another 30. That's a 80-90 runs against swing.

 

That would have brought the Twins down to about 700 runs against, versus 614 runs they scored. If you do Bill James Pythagorean Expectation on that, you get 70 wins. So there is a lot more needed.

 

It's worth noting that the Twins exceeded their Pythag Expectation by quite a bit last year. According to that, they were a 61 win team. They won 66 games.

 

Thank you John, THat is exactly what I was going for in this article. When I saw there was still this huge run differential I was surprised and didn't bother to look at the Pythag Expectation. This exercise was a back of Napkin just to see what a 4.000 era type for 200 innings would have meant vs what we pitched last year in terms of results. The 2nd 200 innings were harder to figure out so I guestimated. The offense however will have to pick it up a lot regardless of who we sign for pitching is what I took from this exercise. so my question is this for 2014.

 

Where does the offensive improvement come from? We would need to score 80 more runs plus sign another 200 inning 4.00 era pitcher at this point just to be around .500 based on the Pythag Expectation.

[PseudoSABR]

Last year we had 30 starts go to DeVries, Hernandez, Walters, and Hendriks for a combined total of innings 158.33 innings with 123 earned runs allowed

Just look at that. And that doesn't touch Gibson's or Worley's contribution evidently. Yipes.

 

What gets lost in a lot of aggregates and metrics that try to attribute a comparison value among all players is that replacement level players differ in value greatly from organization to organization. Nolasco's (or any pitcher's) capacity to pitch 180 innings of even zero-value is materially worth more to the Twins in than it would be to other teams, because the next guys down the line have been very, very bad.