twins1095

Pitching Homer Bailey has less to do with expectations for him by the Twins and everything to do with allowing the Twins to stack their rotation in a way that lines up Maeda/Berrios/Pineda or Hill for the first playoff series.

I think asking Dobnak to learn an entirely new pitch is a tall task. He would need to develop a 4 seam to pitch up in the zone similar to Maeda and even then asking that to be an effective pitch given his lack of velocity seems like a stretch. Working the edges of the plate, sure is something that he could do, but I'm not sure he doesn't do that already and your initial post was about looking to Maeda about pitching at the top of the zone. Maeda has a different pitch mix. I'm not sure it's something Dobnak can replicate... though there may be other things he could do.

I don't agree with this at all. Dobnak's pitches all have huge downward break. I'm not sure that you want him pitching at the top of the zone unless you are advocating for a new pitch mix. I don't think you have to worry about Dobnak's HR rate, though there will be times that HRs are hit off of him.

Great post. I agree with you 100%. I guess the only thing you can say is if mechanic optimization to improve velocity leads also to a command issues.... ....however this ultimately makes me optimistic about Berrios and willing to let him use this regular season to figure out his command issues hoping a couple mphs of more velocity raises his ceiling. Thanks for the post. I learned something.

I'd love to isolate and look at his launch angle during his recent slump, however many games it has been. I think he's getting some bad BABIP luck... but I think for him the issue is launch angle. I have noticed him hitting the ball hard, but with a lot more air under it meaning balls are hanging higher in the air and easier to track down. I am worried that Arraez may have tweaked his swing to try and get more loft on the ball and it is having a negative impact. More likely it's a small mechanical tweak that he needs to make to lower his launch angle and it was accidental. Ultimately, I think Arraez will be fine. He still takes really good ABs and has a great eye and contact skills. That should allow him to be a high obp/high avg guy. Now, how valuable is an average to below average fielder with average speed on the basepaths as a .285 - .295 avg -.350-360 OBP guy versus a .325-.335 avg - .390-.400 obp guy... that's always been the question with Arraez.

What indications do you have to believe that the NHL & NBA won't be able to do their seasons? I'd be interested in learning.

I think games will go on unless Twins players test positive unless the Cardinals start having positive tests on outbreak levels like the Marlins. I think the Phillies lack of positive cases from their players after facing a team with 60% of their players positive is the precedent that the MLB will use until proven otherwise.

Any update on Arraez's availability or potential availability? Still holding out hope he can figure out a way to play with a grade 1 sprain.

Jorge Polanco gets a lot of player comparisons to Jose Ramirez IF Lewis is truly an elite defender at SS, I would fully count out the idea of Polanco shifting to 3rd ala Ramirez either. I know Polanco's arm strength would be suspect there, but hopefully the extra range would make him passable.

He could be and I have advocated for that in the past as well. In all likelihood Buxton will still be part of the mix even if injuries keep him from consistently being part of the mix—which then leaves the scenario the same for Lewis.

Yeah I would put Kirilloff and Larnach ahead of Lewis in the OF pecking order assuming no Buxton. Basically, you have 2 OF spots, 1B, and 3B to divide between Kirilloff, Larnach, Lewis, Rosario, and Sano. That said, I would not mind Lewis in a Marwin Gonzalez role in that scenario with the ability to play any OF spot and 2B, SS, and 3B.

I may have missed this, I thought Kirilloff was playing in the fall league? Is he dealing with an injury?

I'll go with Smeltzer/Dobnak/Graterol combo. I like the idea of matching up them against the other teams ace and then hoping Berrios/Odorizzi match up solidly with a teams #2/#3. I feel like that puts you hopefully at an advantage or even in 2/3's of the games rather than a disadvantage for 3. Although, against the Astros--that might not really matter.

Do we see the Twins trying to get to 4 starters and then playing the opener/long-man game with the 5th starter? I think that's one way to make this process a little bit easier. I think after next season (if not sooner) you start to be in a position for some of that starting depth Graterol/Balazovic/Colina/Duran/Ober/Alcala/etc to hopefully be ready to push for spots. I would rather do the opener/long-man thing with whomever and try to get through it that way than to overpay someone or sign someone mediocre long-term

I really like the way our bullpen has been developing between Rogers/Romo/Dyson/Duffey/May. I think that group can definitely lock down the 7th-9th on a consistent basis. I really like the idea of bringing up Graterol/Alcala/Colina in September and potentially adding 1-2 of them to the playoff roster. While all will likely be raw and hard to trust in high-leverage situations, I really like the idea of pitchers with that kind of stuff taking the 5th-6th innings. From there we can tell our non-Berrios SPs...don't worry, we just need you to get through 4-5 innings with 1-2 runs minimum. The pen has got it from there.

I think part of it is also him being 6'9. He's gotta have really long arms and a release point closer to home plate than most making his MPH play up. Also again being 6'9 he has to have a big time downward plane on his pitches.

He’s actually at .303/.390/1.057 with 22 2b and 33 HRs in 89 games/333 ABs. Ortiz in his age 39/40 seasons was at 146/151 games and 528/537 ABs respectively. Now with that being said, health is a skill especially at older ages. To put in perspective Cruz’s numbers with that many ABs are as follows: .303/.390/1.057 99 runs -35 2B - 52 HRs - 127 RBI Your point does stand. Very similar. Cruz has actually been better, especially during his age 39 season. I hope he makes a similar age 40 jump

I think his last 2 HRs have been as a righty. Very good to see!

This is perfect and super illuminating! For example, Dyson has the same ERA as Trevor May but 30 shutdowns and 6 meltdowns versus May with 15 shut downs and 9 melt downs. When Dyson melts downs he really melts down. (His numbers with the Giants were wild 27 shut downs to 3 meltdowns. Comparatively, Rogers is at 27 and 6 for the whole year)

I like what you’re doing. I’m interested in thinking about different ways to track, chart, and think about relief pitchers. Sam Dyson, Sergio Romo, and Trevor May all have an ERA of between 3.40-3.42, but have seemingly had very different seasons. That is, due to relievers only pitching a few innings a season, and a few bad outings really skewing aggregate numbers... ERA is probably not the best way to think about how successful a reliever is. There definitely is a leverage component you’d have to build out and I think you’ve started it, but I was thinking about trying to track relievers in 2 ways: 1) Create a blow-up metric. My first thought was any outing where a reliever gives up 2 or more runs is a “blow-up”. Blow-ups are really bad for relievers and will more often not lead directly or almost directly to a loss. I don’t think the numbers in a blow-up matter as much as HOW OFTEN a blow-up happens (this especially rings true for high-leverage relievers who normally pitch late in the game and with small leads). A successful reliever will be one who blows up the most infrequently i.e. if Dyson blows up 15% of the time and Romo blows up 10% of the time that means Dyson will lose you a game 3 out of every 20 outings versus 2 for Romo (hypothetical). From there, after isolating the blow-up sample I’d like to take a look at reliever ERA/WHIP/K/BB/etc numbers from their non-blow-up sample. Basically, who is the best outside of the odd outing where they blow-up? This would show you the true talent of a reliever over the majority of their games. Relievers who’s majority of good or non-blow up games are a really high percentage with better ERA/WHIP/etc numbers would be considered the best. My hypothesis is that you’d see that most relievers have pretty good numbers but the key would be how reliable are they to not blow up? I think you’d see a difference between elite relievers and the Trevor May’s of the world in terms of blow up percentage. Thus, a Trevor May is harder to trust and should be a 6th/7th inning guy versus an 8th/9th inning guy. Might put something together with Twins relievers if I get some free time.

My reaction as well. Sano has made changes to his swing that allow him to get to balls in basically *most* (all?) areas of the zone. In addition, these swing changes have given him the confidence to be able to get to fast balls without cheating meaning he can also sit back and wait on breaking stuff in the zone. Further, because he doesn't have to cheat and start his swing so early he's able to wait longer on pitches and not chase breaking stuff that starts in the zone and goes out of the zone. Sano has been among the best at the league at not chasing pitches out of the zone and hitting the ball hard in the zone when it's there. He still does get a lot of strikeouts, but mostly because he's consistently working so deep into counts to wait for good pitches to hit. It's a formula I like because it leads to getting on base a bunch and hitting a bunch of balls hard. Similar to his rookie season, when he's on like this, I've never seen a hitter go 3-2 in counts more consistently (lol). But to go back on topic, I think it's a formula that's foundational in terms of being a successful approach that should allow him to get on base at a high rate and hit a lot of balls hard. I think his success is also important because he knows the things to do to shorten his swing if he starts struggling. I think the biggest threat to his approach is health. If Sano gets injured he may start, maybe by necessity, cheating or doing things that create bad habits. He's a really tough hitter to get out right now. You essentially have to hope that you can get to 2-2 or 3-2 and throw something on the black of the plate because Sano shows a willingness to take pitches on or just off the edge of the plate or hope that a fielder catches a 95+ MPH exit velocity rocket off his bat.

He definitely is, but Duffey as your 4th bullpen guy versus Duffey as your 2nd bullpen guy is a very different thing. Same phenomena with May. He hasn’t figured it out in the same way Duffey has, but I think it’s a when thing for May rather than an if.

It's sustainable until it is not. If Adrianza's numbers start falling off, then it is time to tweak the lineup again. Marwin Gonzalez is not anywhere near a caliber of player that deserves automatic playing time. He doesn't hit for more power than Adrianza and Adrianza has better contact skills and gets on base more.

Arraez is a below average second-baseman defensively.

Also there's the whole thing with pitchers about the clock that quickly ticks down in terms of maintaining velocity and/or avoiding arm injuries and staying healthy. Only so many bullets in the chamber. I think with pitchers it's important to be more aggressive than less, especially if you can bring them up for the last month as a reliever...sheltering them a little bit...getting them good exposure in a way that can potentially help the team. It's actually smart baseball and it's been done by many good and successful playoff teams.