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Some names they might consider: 2B/SS James Beresford 3B Deibinson Romero SP Andrew Albers SP Logan Darnell OF Danny Ortiz RP AJ Achter RP Matt Hauser SP Alex Wimmers 1B Kenny Vargas OF Nate Roberts P Adrian Salcedo RP Ryan O'Rourke 2B/SS Jorge Polanco OF Max Kepler I think Albers will make it on the 40-man yet this year for a look. Looking at who Jeremy has highlighted in purple, I'd agree with Vargas and Kepler. The rest I'd question, with Polanco being the most likely.

That's awesome! How often do guys play more than once? Any chance we see them in the same game next year at TF?

Seth / John, It seems like you both dabble in this saber/stats stuff a bit (maybe more so John). Nick adds great insights and touches on it. Parker does amazing analysis more often related to mechanics. Have there been any efforts to recruit someone a little more saber-heavy to the regular rotation? I certainly wouldn't be that guy, but I do really enjoy reading and trying to understand it. I think it might reach out and draw in another segment of the audience -- especially if it were heavily Twins focused.

I like them. The math is a lot more complicated, but runs win games and are a concept that folks can comprehend. I'm not a fan of the 100 scale rate stats. Counting stats can serve a great purpose for easier comparisons.

Looking at the exact Twins run scoring environment from last year (2012 season stats), I just divided each category by 162 to find single game averages and input those figures to the Markov calculator. This results in 4.313 runs per game -- pretty darn close to the actual 4.32 (699 projected, 701 actual). If we then replace Willingham's 615 PAs with Mauer's equivalent performance, the output is 4.342 runs per game. If we replace Mauer's 641 PAs with Willingham's equivalent performance, the output is 4.277 runs per game. So, having 2 Joe Mauers in the lineup would have been about 10 runs more valuable than 2 Josh Willinghams (equivalent to about 1 additional win).

That's a reasonable reality check, but it's not like we don't need serviceable 4/5 starters also. I think they (Diamond, Albers, Darnell, Hernandez) can fill at least one, if not both, of those roles on the post-season team you speak of. You would hope they could be around league average in those spots (4.20 ERA). When guys like Joe Saunders and Joe Blanton are getting $7MM/year, you can see how a decent #4 earning $.5MM/year is pretty darn valuable to the team.

True on all accounts. If you're defining value as helping the team score runs, Mauer would unequivocally have been more valuable. We see the same thing in the Callaspo/Trumbo example used in the FG article. They had identical wOBA, but Callaspo was more OBP and Trumbo was more SLG. It would take an unrealistically extreme environment for Trumbo to have been "worth" more.

This seemed to make sense to me at first, but even your example turned out to be enough to prove otherwise. The infamous Tom Tango has a simple little Markov tool to find expected runs: Run Expectancy, Run Frequency, Runs Created, Linear Weights Generator. This is also linked to in the FG article that Oxtung posted about Markov a little earlier. If that 9th guy was also .400/.400, that would also be your team OBP/SLG. (I input 40 AB, 12H, 1 2B, 0 3B, 1 HR, 6.7BB, 7K.) That lineup provides expected runs of 6.527. If the 9th guy was actually .300/.500, your team OBP/SLG would end up .389/.411. (Here I input 40 AB, 12H, 1.45 2B, 0 3B, 1 HR, 5.8BB, 7K.) This lineup provides expected runs of only 6.246. So, we're talking almost a full .3 fewer runs per game. I think what we're seeing here is the value of OBP compared to SLG. Adjusted OPS puts the value of OBP at 1.8 to SLG. The 'outs are precious commodities' statement holds a lot of water.

Would that make this version the BS Boys?

I pulled 2012 offensive stats from fangraphs (>150 AB) and threw a spreadsheet together to add in the (SB-2*CS) I proposed earlier. The pool was 401 players. I just added it in to SLG, but it could just as well go in OBP or be calculated separately. Separate might be best for connotation purposes, something like OSG (On-base, speed, and slugging)? Guys like Revere and E Cabrera benefit, along with some guy named Mike Trout that went 49SB/5CS. Interestingly, it doesn't benefit all speed guys. Starlin Castro saw a decrease compared to OPS (25SB/13CS). Jose Tabata got hit the hardest (8SB/12CS). I have to do some actual work for a bit and can't determine if the run correlation is better or worse, but anyone else is welcomed. https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B5Gl53bhfjnPYTFuVENpYVlsMG8/edit?usp=sharing

You're right. The first situation would seem to happen a lot more often than the second. To keep it relatively simple, what about (SB-2*CS)? This would remove credit for the original hit/walk?

I agree. OPS is known to undervalue OBP to start with, but SBs compound it further. Even wOBA, an excellent stat, doesn't account for value added by a SB. Since a SB essentially adds a base to the original hit, I wonder what it would look like if we added (SB-CS) to the SLG portion?

Thanks, Jeremy. And I literally lol'd at the LMFAO reference. I think the previous post about it was sarcasm. If it's approved by the FCC for your children to hear on the radio, it can't be too out of place on an internet blog. Please continue such references. It makes Cistulli a great read on FG.

We're still dealing with a small sample and even if we did this, it wouldn't reflect the current state of the game today with the K proliferating so quickly. Thirty years ago, that player wouldn't even be in the lineup. Today, it's accepted. Believe it or not, 20% is average. Arcia's K rate shouldn't be completely unexpected based on his minor league numbers. The BB rate is decent and his MiLB record suggests it's sustainable if not improvable.

Here's an interesting look at some of Brock's musings on the value of the OBP guy vs the SLG guy. Lineup Styles, Part One - Beyond the Box Score "The high-OBP lineup scored about 10% more runs than the high-SLG lineup. In the comments section, he notes that the lower wOBA gets, the OBP-heavy lineups decrease production faster, eventually being passed by SLG-heavy lineups."

John, it showed up in the article I linked to earlier (Correlation Between Stats and Runs, etc.) in the alternate form a few people pointed out (ISO+OBP). The r value to runs was .941 compared to .960 for OPS alone.

Interesting ideas. Some feedback: I think a big shortfall is assigning full integer values to all outcomes. IE - A strikeout isn't equally as bad as a single is good. Stats like wOBA do a pretty good job of measuring all batting outcomes based on their true impact. Here's a link: wOBA | FanGraphs Sabermetrics Library

I don't have the time to search through every post, but those were the impressions that I (and, I do believe others) were getting. jokin, c'mon, you're making it sound like no one here was relentlessly attacking the Gibby situation. Most of what you mentioned was said, but there was plenty more. Either way, it's in the past and today is a bright new day. Here's to Gibby and some great starts through the dog days of summer.

I asked myself the same thing a few minutes ago. Here was the first link: Correlation Between Stats and Runs, etc. I'll continue to defend OPS even over something like Seth is proposing here, especially if we're talking for the masses. OPS correlates to runs extremely well, something in the neighborhood of .94-.97 ® depending on the source and data pool. Even the most advanced stats can't make a big improvement over that. OPS is something that can be easily explained and understood by casual fans. As for GM analysis, well, I'd hope they're into stuff a lot deeper than both of these...

Thanks. You're absolutely right on Tulo and the high picks. Turner from NC State is a college guy that projects to stay at SS and leadoff -- he's going to get a ton of hype next spring.

I'm not so sure I've seen most people proclaiming "future All-Star", but you make some good points otherwise. How he adjusts and continues to develop will certainly determine his outcome. The Kubel comp seems very achieveable and Jason was a big part of the team for a number of years.

He didn't say there wasn't going to be a limit of some type (which is what you seem to be inferring), just that this rock-solid belief of a hard cap at 130 IP needed to be questioned. While we all want to see Gibson pitch and be successful, I've taken issue here and elsewhere with: 1 - Turning 130 IP into the only possible truth and the line of thought that Gibson has pitched xx innings at AAA, now he can only pitch 130-xx innings. 2 - That there wasn't any sort of a plan at all and there weren't any justifiable reasons to keep Gibson at AAA (ie Super 2, etc). It wouldn't seem likely to me that the Twins will have him make 5-6 starts at MLB. I'm going to wager on closer to 10-12, which would land him somewhere around 150-160 IP -- a realistic number based on evidence of other rehabs, etc.

Agreed on all points. If Baker could have stayed healthy, the Twins would have exercised his option and he'd be our "ace" this year. Hopefully Gibson can exceed Baker's performance though. Gibby has a slightly better K rate and is a heavy GB pitcher as opposed to Baker's FB (and HR) tendencies.

I hear the Twins are looking for Worley to show more consistency. Too soon?