Three of the Twins' Top Prospects Done for the Year

5 hours ago, Heezy1323 said:

I understand the frustration with injuries on the Twins. I understand the tendency to look for systems or people to blame. But the unfortunate truth is, it just doesn't work like that. 

The WWII analogy would be great, if baseball players were made from identical parts on an assembly line and reacted exactly the same way to the same adverse conditions. 

But the challenge of medicine, sports science/performance and similar fields is that there are hundreds, probably thousands of unknowns. And not just unknowns that exist because they haven't been studied- unknowns that cannot possibly be known under any circumstances. 

Is it possible that the medical and/or training staff of the Twins is underperforming? Sure, I suppose that's possible. I am not a Twins physician, but I know those who are. They are admirable docs, among the brightest in the field. 

Isn't it also possible that there is bad luck involved? Or that the scouting department is choosing to draft or trade for players who are prone to injury? Or not weighting the input from the medical team heavily enough? 

Or, is it possible… juuuuuuuuust possible, that this stuff is really frickin' hard. And despite having brilliant people working tremendously hard to solve these types of issues- some injuries are inevitable. 

I'm not trying to carry water for the Twins or anyone/anything else here. I have no vested interest in others' opinions of Twins or their team physicians. But I am familiar with the challenges of solving these types of problems- I do it on a daily basis. It's hard. An in my opinion, assuming it is due to incompetence undersells the difficulty of it by a substantial margin.

 

You reacted strongly to just one of the possibilities I laid out, and FWIW that's the one I consider to be least likely as the major source of shortfall relative to other teams.  I listed all that came to mind, simply for completeness.

Apart from that, I referred to "medical approach", while you extrapolated to "incompetence", which grossly distorts my (emerging) view on the subject.  Maybe I used an additional turn of phrase that was misleading that way.

While no one claims that players are machines, the WW II analogy was based on the idea that managers of any chaotic and stressful process have to make decisions under fire using incomplete information, and despite extreme uniqueness and variability in individual cases, forecasting methods over large numbers tend to emerge from the better organizations.  It's just too critical not to.  The military was an early practitioner of what we consider modern analytics.  Indeed, the final sentence of that analogy paragraph essentially takes the medical staff off the hook.

Said another way, the FO may be dealing the development staff and the medical staff a losing hand.

Said still another way, it's a mantra of those in systems analysis for failure to be only rarely due to individuals, and more often to the process.

I am inclined at the moment to believe that the team's analytic forecasts are not nearly as solid as the FO believes, and that they are placing bets on players that other teams' FOs are saying in effect "sure, you can have him," whether during the draft process, or when acquiring FA, or when considering trades.  You can see it directly in trades for a non-workhorse (Gray, in recent seasons) and an acute injury risk (Paddack), or signings of Bundy and Archer whom they surely understood would tax the bullpen because they themselves should not be overtaxed, or drafting Prielipp who is coming off surgery and may or may not be the same as before. 

I don't think it's even arguable whether the FalVine regime is consciously going against the grain where it comes to injury risk.  (I named only pitchers, above, but signing Buxton to guaranteed money would be another instance, granting that the marketing circumstances may have dictated leaning toward that decision.)  My only question at this point is whether it's a reasonable calculation that may or may not work, or is reckless.

I, like virtually everyone else, appreciate the insights you bring that few of us are qualified to come up with.

On 8/13/2022 at 9:15 AM, Hrbowski said:

The latest research in player development right now suggests that the most important factors relating to pitcher injuries are biomechanics and recovery process between throwing. From what I've heard from people in the industry is that the Twins are way behind on this...

Twins alumnus Doctor Mike Marshall was a proponent of biomechanics way back when he pitched, and claimed that it was the secret to his being able to pitch a hundred games a season.  Who knows if his theories really bore scrutiny and he was shunned by the baseball establishment (due to his brash/cocky personality as much as to the merits of his ideas IMO).  I'm sure there has been a lot of progress since his day.  He's 78 now but I bet would welcome a chance to say I Told You So.