Twins Have to Do Something About the Bullpen

The ONLY one to get is Kimbrel.

 

Kimbrel. Kimbrel. KIMBREL. KIMBREL!

 

Totally off topic ....

This reminded me of a time I was leaving a Slayer concert at Roy Wilkins Auditorium.

I will keep up the mantra - the current bullpen use is unsustainable.  We need a new paradigm.  https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-bullpens-took-over-modern-baseball/  With the average of 4 pitchers per game including starters I see a minimum of 162 x 3 appearances for the year - 486 games (and we have not gotten into the starter yet).  With the 8 pitchers you list in the BP an equal distribution of appearances would have them all at 60!  Then you do not want the manager to blow out their arms.  This does not work. 

Well, I always like to look ahed with the crystal ball. Who will be in the pen in 2020 and 2021. Will any of these guys be a closer-in-training in 2019? If not, then we need to BUY a closer.

Not a lot of hold over salary, and enough names in the minors to make us forget people like Duffy and Addison in the near future. Addison Reed is more of a tradechip now than a solution.

What is the status of Romero as being a rotation stud? Seems a shame to doom him to the bullpen if he has any promise as being a major arm...unless he can become the light's out closer we need...next day.

I'm happy with the bullpen. A veteran closer would be a plus and the Twins can afford the investment if there IS an arm that won't stick it to your payroll in years 2-3-or-4 of a contract.

The answer is simple: Ramos for Capps.

I will keep up the mantra - the current bullpen use is unsustainable.  We need a new paradigm.  https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-bullpens-took-over-modern-baseball/  With the average of 4 pitchers per game including starters I see a minimum of 162 x 3 appearances for the year - 486 games (and we have not gotten into the starter yet).  With the 8 pitchers you list in the BP an equal distribution of appearances would have them all at 60!  Then you do not want the manager to blow out their arms.  This does not work. 

Is that assuming that a team doesn't make any roster moves after April 1? Considering injuries, trades, roster emergencies, parental leave, etc, I don't see the issue.

I will keep up the mantra - the current bullpen use is unsustainable.  We need a new paradigm.  https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-bullpens-took-over-modern-baseball/  With the average of 4 pitchers per game including starters I see a minimum of 162 x 3 appearances for the year - 486 games (and we have not gotten into the starter yet).  With the 8 pitchers you list in the BP an equal distribution of appearances would have them all at 60!  Then you do not want the manager to blow out their arms.  This does not work. 

If Romero and Mejia are on a pattern of pitching 2-3 innings twice a week  that shifts things considerably.

I don't understand all the consternation about the bullpen while our system has developed practically no starting pitching for over a dozen seasons until Berrios finally emerged.  Isn't this a far bigger issue than us not raiding the reliever market this offseason?  TO me it is.

We rolled the dice trying to build our bullpen last season and some of the deals looked good at first and they turned out to be crap.  Relievers are not a set commodity.  THey are so up and freakin down it's ridiculous.  See Brad Lidge.  Relievers, for the most part, are failed starters.  To carry on about getting veteran reliever X and Y seems like a waste of time when we can't develop pitching ourselves.

Maybe I am not on this bandwagon to grouse about adding relievers is that I am not expecting too much out of this team.  I want to see certain players develop and then if that happens I would like us to be more aggressive at the trade deadline.  I know some posters hate this philosophy, but quite frankly, signing a Boxberger or some other ham and egger reliever isn't going to get me pumped and it won't turn us around.  

What is the solution?  Dump most of the bullpen and replace them with new guys? I like the idea of Romero starting in the pen.  I will hope Hildy and Reed can do better than they did last year.  I am not going to go crazy over the pen. In 2002 we had Romero, Hawkins, Fiori (and Santana some of the time) all emerge to make for a solid pen.  Very few relievers are to be counted on to perform at a consistent level year after year. I am far more worried about the rotation and everyone else should be as well

Yes... Stuff matters. Starting with May, Rogers, Hildenberger, Reed and Parker is solid. Romero in the bullpen is really exciting. Magill increased his average fastball in 2018 to 94.7 as well as his spin rate. Mejia could be out there. Vasquez and Moya have big potential. 

 

I'd be fine with adding a guy like Warren on a minor league deal. He's still relatively young.  

With 3 of the 5 in bold having forgettable seasons (yes... even Hildenberger, when even when his stat line was good early..... was giving up excessive inherited runs and losing games for us, but just for other pitchers on the team), and Rodgers really just breaking out for the end of the season and May still a question without even a full season back from TJ, that is surely a bold optimistic stance.  

If Baldelli goes into the season with relatively equal confidence in May, Romero, Reed, Rogers, Parker and Hildenberger there is little chance they get overworked unless the starters consistently fail to get out of the 5th inning.

Baldelli's confidence aside, with Perez, Odorizzi, and Pineda as the 3-5 starters they may be overworked regardless. 

there is no offseason solution to one problem (long term failure to develop starting pitching), but there is for the other (lack of arms on the 2019 bullpen.)

That's why it makes sense to complain about one problem in terms of 2019.

We signed free agent relievers last winter.  We could have easily done the same thing and had the same lousy results.  Relievers are generally a crapshoot.  Very few of them are consistent year to year so I can't pretend to know who we need to get in the pen.  I suppose we could have thrown money and Juerys Familia at guys like Andrew Miller and that would have made everyone happy, but how they perform is in 2019 is anyone's guess and some of the best relievers in the game in 2019 can be guys no one here would ever know to name.

This is why I will leave the complaining about the pen to others.  My focus is on our young position players and the rotation right now.

With 3 of the 5 in bold having forgettable seasons (yes... even Hildenberger, when even when his stat line was good early..... was giving up excessive inherited runs and losing games for us, but just for other pitchers on the team), and Rodgers really just breaking out for the end of the season and May still a question without even a full season back from TJ, that is surely a bold optimistic stance.  

You're not being fair to Parker, who had a nice solid season. He was substantially better than either Hildenberger or Reed. So we're really looking at hoping a guy can bounceback from injury & overwork (Reed) who has a strong track record of success, and improvement from a young guy who had a bad second half (possibly because of overwork, possibly just because of being exposed) in that top 5.

Bullpens are frequently so fungible that I remain convinced that you're better building one through development rather than FA. supplementing a role, occasionally grabbing a high-end guy...sure. but considering the supposed talent in our system (and I do believe in that talent) I think we're better off rolling with that group unless we add to the top end of the 'pen.

 In the lineup projection thread, as well as Do-Hyoung Park's projected lineup (IIRC), we rolled with Parker, Reed, May, Hildenberger, Rogers, plus Mejia and Romero.    That saved room on the roster for a 4th bench player (either Austin, Astudillo, or Duda).

There also seems to be a consensus that we do not want to roll the dice on middling relievers, giving 30-40 innings to some spanking new signing over the development of the above list (as well as potential openers like Gonsalves or Stewart or Littell), or thwart the progress of Thorpe to make the rotation, or prevent Moya or Magill or Vasquez from having an open position to slide into because we added a contract that we are financially reluctant to shed, or waiting solely for injuries to create opportunities.

Just saying, the "don't sign anyone but Kimbrel, but only if he's not too long or expensive, but we can't go with what we have, we haven't addressed the bullpen sufficiently" box is a tiny one, indeed.    I am convinced there is better value in picking up a tanking team's best reliever mid-season than rolling the dice on anyone but Kimbrel, and am more optimistic than most on here about what we have now.

Final note - I think everyone should have to file an "environmental impact statement" along with their suggestions - you cannot simultaneously say "go get this guy" without saying "dump this guy" if there is a roster consequence to your move.  (So if we get Kimbrel, I move Romero back to AAA as a starter.)

Romero in the bullpen is really exciting. 

Why is this exciting? We never gave him a real shot as a starter in the majors and I'm supposed to be glad that we moved him to the pen to make room for Martin Perez?

List of all relievers signed by small/mid-market clubs this off-season, for more than a $5 million commitment (total, not per year):

St. Louis - Andrew Miller - 2/25

Oakland - Joakim Soria - 2/15

San Diego - Garrett Richards - 2/15

That's it. Granted, this is out of 13 total players (Kimbrel will eventually be #14). Six of the 13 signed with a team that plays in New York or Los Angeles. San Diego has obviously been on a spending spree.

I did think the Twins might add someone like Soria or Cody Allen, but the reality is that free agent relievers are not highly valued by MLB clubs in general. The huge market teams don't really care if $10 million a year goes up in smoke, so they sign guys for depth and don't worry too much about the dubious nature of the investment.

In addition to their high level of uncertainty, relievers are also the most practical players to acquire during the year via trade (i.e., at a prospect & salary price that even the Twins could easily pay).

So while there are a lot of complaints about the Twins approach, this is what small and mid-market teams do, including the ones that are unquestionably well-run. The Twins front office certainly won't look good if the bullpen is awful, but I'm not going to pre-judge it.