Mailbag: Duda In, Gordon’s Future, Contention Time

Somehow the only big excitement for the Twins is first base - Cron, Austin, Duda, Sano.  First Base is not usually the critical position for teams and this emphasis leaves me cold.  It is the rest of the infield that I really care about and that is both offense and defense. 

13 pitchers makes for a 3-man bench. Once the schedule picks up and the 13th pitcher becomes a fixture, a platoon of a Cron and Duda...two guys that can’t play any position other than first base becomes...next to impossible. A much more likely platoon at first would be Duda (if he were to win the job) and Sano...with Adrianza (sigh) playing third against lefties.

I don't see Duda making the team unless injury strikes, though I am of the opinion that Austin will be hanging around on the roster. 

I'm not sure about Nick Gordon anymore... he might end up as a utility infielder with the way things have gone - not great SS defense, power hasn't developed, not great OBP skills... yikes.

I think Nick is getting a really bad rap and it seems like fans always want to be so quick to jump off the band wagon. All that has happened so far is that Nick had a really bad 3 month at Rochester. In a quarter of the season at Chattanooga last year Nick had 10 doubles, 3 triples and 5 homers while having a slash line of .333/.381.525. Those extra base numbers would total 40 doubles, 12 triples and 20 homers over a full season. That is an iso power of .192 which is excellent. Thru June 7th at Rochester he still had an OPS above .800. In the 1st half of 2017 over 64 games Gordon put up 21 doubles, 6 triples and 6 homers. That would equate to 50 doubles, 15 triples and 15 homers over a full season. His slash line in that 1st half was .315/.376/.504. Those power and OBP number look just fine to me. I think this more a case that Gordon really wears down in the 2nd half of seasons. That isn’t totally uncommon for young players, especially ones Gordon’s size. It is also something that can improve as he matures and gains strength. I really expect Nick to get off to a great start this year in Rochester like has has in every other year.

Like Kohl Stewart before him, I have been off the Nick Gordon bandwagon for more than a year, since his cool second half at AA in 2017.  Won't be looking to jump back on until I see a sustained performance in 2019.  As for Kohl, really liked the progress he made with the Twins last fall and will be looking for his wagon to make a stop at my wagon stop.

Have a question, Cody, about Brusdar Graterol.  Do you think there is a chance, or even a good chance, that he is in the Blue Wahoo starting rotation with a good spring?  I know the Twins like to start players where they finished the prior year if they were there only part of the year.  But there is a lot of new management in the organization and Graterol may be good enough to get a real good push up the ladder.  Your thoughts?

Kepler is interesting.  He was known as a good OBP guy at AA and AAA, but it has not translated to MLB.  There is some power there as we have seen, but low batting averages and low OBP has me concerned.

Maybe someone can answer this for me. The Twin Cities are the 16th largest market in the US. They have the 20th ranked tv deal. Seattle just passed us for the 15th ranked metro area. They have the 5th highest tv deal. What gives? Our games are shown statewide and in neighboring states. Not the case for Seattle. Maybe I should apply for a job?

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:52 AM, Supfin99 said:

I think Nick is getting a really bad rap 

I see what you did there

  On 2/12/2019 at 1:45 PM, Original Whizzinator said:

Maybe someone can answer this for me. The Twin Cities are the 16th largest market in the US. They have the 20th ranked tv deal. Seattle just passed us for the 15th ranked metro area. They have the 5th highest tv deal. What gives? Our games are shown statewide and in neighboring states. Not the case for Seattle. Maybe I should apply for a job?

Not that I think there's any chance the Twins can approach that type of TV deal, but their current deal is more than a few years old, which is probably one of the reasons it's pretty far down in the rankings. 

Let's look at the market size for a second...

SEA-TAC - 3.9M

MSP - 3.6M

But obviously the games are being broadcast beyond the immediate metro area. Let's look at the regional population, where the "local" games are likely being broadcast

Washington + Oregon + Idaho = 13.5M

Minnesota + ND + SD = 7.2M

There are some parts of Wisconsin and Iowa that are part of the Twins region, but not the very populated parts. At most, it probably adds up to 8.5M

  On 2/12/2019 at 5:16 AM, Mike Sixel said:

Austin, Cron, Duda, Cruz....

Other teams are looking for guys that can play multiple positions, and the Twins have brought in four DH, 1B, types. Right after drafting Rooker.

I don't get it.
 

It must be the shift. Play 4 firstbasemen and pitch the lefties inside.

  On 2/12/2019 at 1:45 PM, Original Whizzinator said:

Maybe someone can answer this for me. The Twin Cities are the 16th largest market in the US. They have the 20th ranked tv deal. Seattle just passed us for the 15th ranked metro area. They have the 5th highest tv deal. What gives? Our games are shown statewide and in neighboring states. Not the case for Seattle. Maybe I should apply for a job?

We get Seattle games in Oregon, and I believe that they go out to Idaho and maybe Western Montana and parts of Utah as well. Their region seems comparable to the Twins'.

"Last year’s club was a good example of why one-year deals don’t typically work. There were a bunch of players with no connection to the club and very little team chemistry. Minnesota is never going to outspend other teams and I doubt many big-name free agents are identifying the Twins as an ideal destination for their talents."

But yet they are repeating the same thing over again this season. We could be looking at 9-10 players on the OD roster who weren't on it last opening day. With all of the 1 year deals we have on hand now we could potentially be looking at the same scenario next season. When we won our WS's all those so many years ago it was due in large part b/c those guys knew each other like the back of their own hand. When does Falvine learn?

Duda? Now? Does this even make sense? So what if one, two or three of these guys knocks the cover off the ball and fields like a demon in spring training?  It's not indicative of what we'll get come regular season, especially for the entire year!  All you are doing is providing fodder fanbase and media of shoulda, coulda, woulda... BOOO!

  On 2/12/2019 at 1:45 PM, Original Whizzinator said:

Maybe someone can answer this for me. The Twin Cities are the 16th largest market in the US. They have the 20th ranked tv deal. Seattle just passed us for the 15th ranked metro area. They have the 5th highest tv deal. What gives? Our games are shown statewide and in neighboring states. Not the case for Seattle. Maybe I should apply for a job?

As part of their TV deal, weren't the Twins were given partial ownership of Fox Sports North?  That has to make their TV deal more valuable than it seems.

In a related note, I see now that Jim Pohlad has joined an effort to buy the entire Fox Sports Network.

  On 2/12/2019 at 3:49 PM, killertwinfan said:

Duda? Now? Does this even make sense? So what if one, two or three of these guys knocks the cover off the ball and fields like a demon in spring training? It's not indicative of what we'll get come regular season, especially for the entire year! All you are doing is providing fodder fanbase and media of shoulda, coulda, woulda... BOOO!

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:52 AM, Supfin99 said:

I think Nick is getting a really bad rap and it seems like fans always want to be so quick to jump off the band wagon. 

Not sure what you mean by that.  He had a .544 OPS in 382 at Rochester last year.  There have been concerns about his glove and how he can hold up to a long season.  I had a much more positive view of him before the his callup to Rochester, but after that performance I am not so sure how can take a glass half full view of him at this point in time.  

If not a single person said BOO about him he would still need to dig himself of this hole that he is in now.

He had a bad 3 months in his first exposure to AAA in the second half of the season.  All I'm saying is have a little patience before we just write guys off.  Gordon will play this entire season at 23.  

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:52 PM, ewen21 said:

Not sure what you mean by that.  He had a .544 OPS in 382 at Rochester last year.  There have been concerns about his glove and how he can hold up to a long season.  I had a much more positive view of him before the his callup to Rochester, but after that performance I am not so sure how can take a glass half full view of him at this point in time.  

 

If not a single person said BOO about him he would still need to dig himself of this hole that he is in now.

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:18 PM, Danchat said:

Dude, it’s a minor league deal, it’ll take at least one injury for him to get on the roster. Teams make signings like this all the time...

Don't we have two of him already at first base?  FO is feeling the heat and trying to make it like they are doing something when they are doing more of nothing.  Still BOO!

  On 2/12/2019 at 3:31 PM, PDX Twin said:

We get Seattle games in Oregon, and I believe that they go out to Idaho and maybe Western Montana and parts of Utah as well. Their region seems comparable to the Twins'.

That region has twice as many people as the Twins region.

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:58 PM, Supfin99 said:

He had a bad 3 months in his first exposure to AAA in the second half of the season.  All I'm saying is have a little patience before we just write guys off.  Gordon will play this entire season at 23.  

Again.  If not a single person said a thing about his performance he would still have to dig himself of the hole he has dug.

  On 2/12/2019 at 5:16 AM, Mike Sixel said:

Austin, Cron, Duda, Cruz....

Other teams are looking for guys that can play multiple positions, and the Twins have brought in four DH, 1B, types. Right after drafting Rooker.

I don't get it.

And until Duda, it was four RIGHT-HANDED power bats with little or no defensive flexibility.

They knew they would lose Mauer's left-handed OBP...they chose to part with Grossman's left-handed OBP...so they picked up more right-handed power bats (Cruz and Cron) with mediocre OBP to go with the questionable OBP right-handed power bats they already had (Austin and Rooker).

Cruz was a no-brainer. But Cron and Austin are totally redundant, and potential blockers of Rooker depending upon how the season goes. Then you add Duda in what seems a complete after-thought even though it doesn't immediately cost a roster spot..."Wait...all our marginal and inflexible first-basemen are right-handed. We have to find a margin and inflexible left-handed first baseman." Weird to say the least.

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:08 PM, Einheri said:

As part of their TV deal, weren't the Twins were given partial ownership of Fox Sports North? That has to make their TV deal more valuable than it seems.

In a related note, I see now that Jim Pohlad has joined an effort to buy the entire Fox Sports Network.

  On 2/12/2019 at 4:52 AM, Supfin99 said:

I think Nick is getting a really bad rap and it seems like fans always want to be so quick to jump off the band wagon. All that has happened so far is that Nick had a really bad 3 month at Rochester. In a quarter of the season at Chattanooga last year Nick had 10 doubles, 3 triples and 5 homers while having a slash line of .333/.381.525. Those extra base numbers would total 40 doubles, 12 triples and 20 homers over a full season. That is an iso power of .192 which is excellent. Thru June 7th at Rochester he still had an OPS above .800. In the 1st half of 2017 over 64 games Gordon put up 21 doubles, 6 triples and 6 homers. That would equate to 50 doubles, 15 triples and 15 homers over a full season. His slash line in that 1st half was .315/.376/.504. Those power and OBP number look just fine to me. I think this more a case that Gordon really wears down in the 2nd half of seasons. That isn’t totally uncommon for young players, especially ones Gordon’s size. It is also something that can improve as he matures and gains strength. I really expect Nick to get off to a great start this year in Rochester like has has in every other year.

Do what you just did with any player and you can make them look good. If this guy didn't have this bad stretch, they would be great. Hope you are right though and he is just young and small. 

  On 2/12/2019 at 7:19 PM, spycake said:

I don't understand this argument, in the context of not trying to add significant external talent this offseason.

 

This was a 78 win team last season, and 85 the year before. Regardless of what the young core does, adding 3-4-5 WAR players right now could be huge to this team's fate.

 

Especially close losses.  Was it 12 walk off losses?  Add talent to the bullpen and maybe some of those games are extended and the Cruz led offense can turn 8 of those into wins.

I don't understand why people suddenly the Twins to spend like a top 10 team. These are two analytics guys. The whole premise behind bringing them in was to build a competitive cost-effective club.

They are not going to take costly risks by definition. About the only time they might is if this team has a more stable core. Not sure why so many are challenged by this notion

  On 2/12/2019 at 3:00 AM, Cody Christie said:

Chattanooga likely starts the year with a six-man rotation, but the organization most assuredly will be using more openers during the season. The Blue Wahoos’ bullpen will be equally important.

Pretty cool that the Blue Wahoos' official account threw in a mailbag question.

...But what's this about the Chattanooga rotation? I have no interest in the Reds' minor league system.