Guardians 6, Twins 5: Twins Drop Winnable Opener to Guardians

12 hours ago, VivaBomboRivera! said:

So, who called for Pagan to throw one slider after another to the Franimal? 

Madness.

I actually don’t see an issue with this. Reyes is very strikeout prone. Guys like him often swing and miss at breaking balls. Ryan struck him out throwing nothing but sliders early in the game, if I remember correctly. It’s not pitch selection, but placement. You gotta hit your spots. 

Good call out on the Twins taking pitches. It may seem they don't due to their inconsistency from game to game. Too bad Polanco was not in the lineup. Hope his return is on the horizon. Thanks for the information.

GO TWINS!

Twins Geezer out!

I see a lot of complaints about Rocco not having Correa bunt and about him pitching Pagan against the stronger part of the Cleveland order in the eighth inning. I actually disagree with both of those criticisms, but have a different criticism. It just doesn't make sense to have your best hitter bunt down one run with a runner on second, particularly when the hitters behind him (Kepler, Sanchez, Urshela) are not hitting and have not shown themselves to be  run producers. Having Correa hit gives us the best chance to score in that situation. Using the more experienced reliever in Pagan to pitch against the better hitters also make sense to me, although Duran may be more ready for that role as the season goes on. This isn't Rocco's fault, the front office made an ill – advised trade to try to get a young starting pitcher by giving up our best relief pitcher, then Alcala got hurt, Duffy imploded, and Stashak is gone again for the year. None of those are Rocco's fault. He is doing what he can with a shorthanded bullpen.

My big criticism of Rocco is the batting order. I know I have beaten this drum probably to death, but Kepler, Sanchez, and Urshela are not nor will they ever be consistent middle of the order run producers. They should be hitting 7, 8, and 9, not anywhere near the 4, 5 or 6 spots unless there's an injury. We are an inconsistent offensive team because we cannot find guys to hit in the 5 and 6 spots that consistently drive in runs. We will struggle until we fix that problem and we know that Kepler, Urshela, and Sanchez are not the solution.

I think the best thing Rocco could do for this team's offense is to move Kirilloff to the 5 hole and Miranda to the 6 hole, leaving Kepler 7, Urshela 8 and the catcher 9. Try this for a month, see if they produce. At the same time, work in Larnach some to see if he can learn how to hit a major league breaking ball since he might be a guy that could fill that 5 or 6 role, and have Garlick start and hit number 4 or 5 against any left-handed starter with Kirilloff and Miranda still in the lineup hitting 6 and 7. This is after Polanco comes back, now they move up one. When Polanco returns either Larnach goes back to AAA to work on his breaking ball hitting or Celestino goes to AAA and Gordon becomes the backup CF. 

We need better, more consistent run producers after the top four guys. I think there is a much better chance of achieving that result with Kirilloff, Miranda and Garlick in the 5 and 6 spots. This probably means fewer at bats for Urshela so we can squeeze Miranda in at 3B twice a week, and fewer to no DH at bats for Sanchez. I see those both these things as positives. I want to do this now because the next six weeks are when we find out who can do what, and fine tune the team for stretch drive that actually seems like it might be meaningful this year. We need to know if Kirilloff and Miranda are ready to help us in this way or not.  

1 hour ago, chpettit19 said:

"Rocco is too stuck with his 'grand plans,' just does what the spreadsheet tells him to, and doesn't adjust for the situation! The Twins need to fire him!" 

"Bunt Buxton/Correa because that's what the 'grand plan' is when the winning run is on second, what the 'right way to play the game' says you should do, and who the hitters are in that situation shouldn't make you adjust the plan! I should be manager so I can follow my 'grand plans' that are obviously smarter than Rocco's!"

Fans, and their thought processes, are truly fascinating.

Fans complaining about managers/coaches and their decisions/choices how dare they. We need to stomp this out before it catches on in other sports and other cities.

Baldelli pinch hitting for Kirelloff just pissed me off at the time and it bit us in the end.

Playing college baseball back in my day at Univ of Maryland, our coaching staff blasted us for failing to get a bunt down 3 times in a game as a team that we lost the day before by score of 1-0.  So guess what we did.  He put us in position groups, all pitchers went 1st, then outfielders, then infielders including catchers.  Our slowest guys on the team ran the bases in situations: guy on 2nd no outs to move him over.  You could bunt or hit to right side of diamond.  If you swung and didn't hit it to right side it was a fail and the portion group got dinged for it.  2 hour practice and this is all we did.  Coaches figured out who could do it, or better feel was who cared to do it.  He narrowed each position group down to one guy from each.  Rest of the year, he knew he had at least 3 guys who could do it and they were pitch hitters in the situation that called for it.  Final 33 games of the year, we successfully sacrificed ourselves for the team by converting 18 straight times resulting in 17 runs scored from 3rd base or suicide squeeze.  If you don't work on it, never comes easier.  Big league players get paid to play the game and I don't care how much they make.  Do the job!

2 hours ago, chpettit19 said:

The Twins are 6th in all of baseball in pitches seen per plate appearance, and actually above league average. So statistically speaking they're actually very good at making a pitcher work on a consistent basis. Better than all but 5 teams, in fact.

Polanco is 11th in baseball, Arraez is 22nd, Buxton 34th, Sanchez 62nd.

Polanco and Arraez absolutely have an approach that forces a pitcher to "work," but Buxton and Sanchez strike out a ton. I'm curious how much of an impact K% has on pitches seen per plate appearance. 

36 minutes ago, chpettit19 said:

I mean at the end of the day Polanco sees 4.26 Pitches/PA, Arraez 4.16, Buxton 4.10, and Sanchez 3.96. So they all see 4 pitches per plate appearance. I'd think the pitcher is throwing his best pitches to Buxton since he knows Buxton can take him deep if he just lays one in there. So to me the pitcher is "working" just as hard in those Buxton PAs as he is in the Polanco or Arraez PAs. Now the end results of the PA may be different, but a Buxton K on 4 pitches is just as much work as an Arraez single on 4 pitches, isn't it?

We can get into things like swinging vs looking strike percentages, chase rates, etc. and say that Buxton and Sanchez could make the pitcher work even harder by not having such high swinging strike percentages, or chasing so many pitches, but at the end of the day the pitcher is having to throw 4 good pitches, on average, every time one of those 4 guys come up. I'd honestly have guessed that Arraez would have a much larger lead on Buxton here, though. The Twins K rates definitely raise their pitches per plate appearance numbers, but it's still making the pitchers work more than most teams. It'd just be nice if the end results of some of those plate appearances weren't strikeouts. Although, to be fair, the Twins are actually exactly league average in SO% (22.2%), and above average in BB% (9.0% which is 8th in baseball).

Possibly yeah, obviously more goes into it than just K%, I was singling out one factor. Agreed, I'm not going down the rabbit hole of chase rates, swinging strikes, ect. I don't necessarily think all strikes are created equal, and I certainly wouldn't put a Sanchez AB in the same category with Arraez. That was part of my nitpick. 

Same. Yeah, I saw they were middle of the pack in team K rate. I'm too lazy to look up what kind of impact extremes like Arraez or maybe Polanco have on the pitches seen per appearance, i.e. are the Twins the 6th most patient lineup in baseball, or is their current position buoyed by a couple guys while the rest of the lineup is more or less in line with the K% - average. It looked like moving 1% in either direction has them in the top or bottom third of the league as far as K% goes. 

Well reported Jamie. Ryan isn't 100% that resulted in some early runs but it was great to see him go out there and SO the side in his final innning, This was a winnable game that should have been won, and hurt losing. Pagan has put in some good performances this year but he hasn't proven to us that he can come in a close and big game and w/o a doubt shut down the competion. I wish FO will stop showcasing Pagan to try to make him look good. I get it that we really don't have anyone beside Duran to come in and that is why I'm really missing Rogers. 

I was totally against the Rogers/ Paddack trade, FO told CC that we were in a competing mode. So why trade away our only dependable closer? it doesn't make sense. Maybe eventually Pagan will become that closer we need but we don't need him next year we need him right now. Rogers has helped SD to be competive, right now we are hurting and FO needs to find some one like Rogers to help us to get to and advance in the play offs.

To end on a positive note. Arraez is producing like an all-star he should be voted in as one.

8 hours ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

The Buxton that was 0 - 4 with 3 K's can't bunt? He walked so not horrible call not bunting, but in a tie game in the 10th with guys at 1st and 2nd and no outs I telling Correa to bunt.

If the home team comes up in extra innings and the away team didn't score, it should be an automatic bunt to start the inning.

You want your number three hitter bunting with the winning run in scoring position?

6 hours ago, Squirrel said:

Yeah, me too ... it's why whenever someone says we need to trade for a starter, I counter ... no ... BP arms (plural); GOOD BP arms (plural). We might not always like Rocco's usage, but he doesn't have a lot to work with, imo. 

I guess the new fangled baseball isn't for old time fans who loved to see the same players everyday and also not really a fan of how soft they are becoming  Soft so they can extend their careers or so the owners get their money's worth.  Give me Mickey Mantel and Roger Maris any day!

29 minutes ago, Doctor Gast said:

To end on a positive note. Arraez is producing like an all-star he should be voted in as one

So why does his name coming up so often in trade situations?  How long do we have before we lose him because his big pay day is coming up?

Anyone else think Gordon was safe on the steal?    We get that call instead of goes against us and everyone is talking about the nice win.    

14 hours ago, prouster said:

You want your number three hitter bunting with the winning run in scoring position?

In extra innings with guys at 1st and 2nd in a tie game, yup, shouldn't your number 4 batter be able to hit a fly ball? You need one run to win the game, I am going to do whatever it takes to win. Do I want Correa bunting in the first 9 innings or needing more than 1 run to win in extra innings, absolutely not.

34 minutes ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

In extra innings with guys at 1st and 2nd in a tie game, yup, shouldn't your number 4 batter be able to hit a fly ball? You need one run to win the game, I am going to do whatever it takes to win. Do I want Correa bunting in the first 9 innings or needing more than 1 run to win in extra innings, absolutely not.

Strongly disagree. He’s the guy that’s paid to drive in that run. 

7 minutes ago, prouster said:

Strongly disagree. He’s the guy that’s paid to drive in that run. 

The way I look at it is there is someplace between 28% and 29% he gets a hits. (Basically his career average), Kepler has a 24% chance of getting a hit. Neither of them are great odds. But if Correa moves the runners up, Kepler has 23 career sac flies or if they walk him, Sanchez already has 2 this year.

Now since Correa doesn't have even one career sac bunt (that I can tell), the odds are he would have failed and this would be moot, but even giving a sign that he might bunt can change the fielders position and the pitches mind set

4 hours ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

The way I look at it is there is someplace between 28% and 29% he gets a hits. (Basically his career average), Kepler has a 24% chance of getting a hit. Neither of them are great odds. But if Correa moves the runners up, Kepler has 23 career sac flies or if they walk him, Sanchez already has 2 this year.

Now since Correa doesn't have even one career sac bunt (that I can tell), the odds are he would have failed and this would be moot, but even giving a sign that he might bunt can change the fielders position and the pitches mind set

Correa came up with the winning run on second base and nobody out. You have your 3, 4, and 5 hitters in line to drive that run in. By letting him swing, your giving the team three chances to drive the run in instead of two. I just don’t think it’s good baseball to have your three hole hitter bunt, especially when the winning run is looking at him across the diamond.