jay

There has been a lot of angst this offseason about the Twins not signing an experienced bullpen arm or two. I feel like January 2014 all over again. Everyone was saying we needed to sign some starting pitching. In back to back years we have signed Nolasco and Santana. If you go by salary our rotation would be Santana, Hughes, Nolasco, Milone and Gibson. If you went by actually trying to win you would probably go Hughes, Santana, Gibson, Duffy and Berrios. The 1st rotation would cost around 40 Million this year. The 2nd would cost less than 25 Million. Does anyone really want Nolasco and Milone in the rotation over Duffy and Berrios? Looking at 2017 would anyone want Nolasco, Milone and Santana over Duffy, Berrios and Stewart or Gonzalves?
 
I feel like it is the same way with bullpen arms now this season. Have we learned nothing? Everyone is clamoring for us to hand out bloated contracts to the likes of Bastardo and O'Day. I don't care about saving or spending the Pohlads money. I want the Twins to have the best team on the field. Having a guy like Bastardo might have meant a slight improvement for the bullpen for April and May. But I don't want to have any of those guys holding spots and keeping young guys from coming up. There is so much bullpen talent that is very close to being ready. From the right side you have Tonkin, Presley, Burdi, Reed, Chargois, Peterson and Paulson who have all pitched in AA already. From the left side you have Rogers, Darnel, Melotakis and Booser. Almost everyone of these guys hits 95 or higher on the gun. The 2 guys that don't are excellent against lefties. In April the bullpen I'd like to see is Perkins, May, Jepsen, Fien, Tonkin, Rogers and Nolasco. Come June 1st I would love for it to be Perkins, May, Jepsen, Burdi, Tonkin, Melotakis and Rogers. That is a young but extremely talented and hard throwing bullpen that can compete with Kansas City. Plus it would cost slightly more than Darren O'Day is making this season.

First, the results. Then, how in the heck I got them. We’ll use Wins Above Replacement (WAR) to assess how well the Twins have drafted in the first round from 2003 to 2011 compared to the rest of the league.
 
From 2003-2011, the Twins’ first-round picks were:
23rd in expected WAR per pick. This is an indication of their consistently low draft position due to successful teams and supplemental round picks.
15th in total expected WAR. The Twins make up ground here due to the additional picks they gained in the supplemental round as compensation for losing free agents.
19th in actual WAR generated. The Twins draft picks from 2003-2011 have produced WAR at a lower rate than the league average.
19th in pick efficiency. This most directly ties to “how well they drafted” after accounting for both draft position and total number of picks. I’m defining pick efficiency as the ratio of actual WAR to expected WAR.
 
This has certainly had an impact on the poor results we’ve seen out of the team from 2011-2014. Many other avenues of talent acquisition exist, but for teams like the Twins and many others, the acquisition of amateurs plays a large role. The draft goes much deeper than the first round, but failing to get significant production there can be quite the challenge to overcome.
 
It’s amazing how a Mike Trout or a Clayton Kershaw can make your team look good at first round draft picks, as seen by the Angels and Dodgers. The Red Sox did poorly from 2006 going forward as shown in Parker’s recent analysis, but they get credit for Jacoby Ellsbury and a few others here. The Diamondbacks did well, but traded away Scherzer, J. Upton and Stephen Drew – their top 3 performing picks. You might also notice a pretty strong correlation between the teams at the bottom of the list and the teams that have stunk in recent years. Sure would hate to be a Phillies fan – that organization has managed to get negative WAR out of their first rounds picks – yow-ouuch.
 
The Twins didn’t hit any homers with their first round picks in this timeframe. However, expectations needed to be tempered in the first place. They’ve underperformed even to that lowered standard, but this analysis doesn’t show them to be among the very worst either.
 
Smack-dab middle of the pack in total expected WAR + below average pick efficiency + trading away the draft pick that represented over a third of the actual WAR generated (Garza) for a terrible left fielder = very little visible MLB production for the Twins out of the 2003-2011 first round picks.
 


 
*****************
 
Now, for those so inclined, the approach.
 
Over the last decade, a number of extremely smart statistical researchers have explored the value of draft picks. I am not one of them. For simplicity, I decided to use the figures created by Andrew Ball (which are quite similar to others out there):
Tier 1 – Pick #1 Expected WAR = 11.83
Tier 2 – Pick #2 Expected WAR = 10.09
Tier 3 – Pick #3-7 Expected WAR = 5.37
Tier 4 – Pick #8-15 Expected WAR = 5.21
Tier 5 – Pick #16-30 Expected WAR = 2.65
Tier 6 – Pick #31-60 Expected WAR = 1.41
 
It is important to note that the expected WAR figures represent only the first 6 years of a player’s career. This is done with the expectation that teams are paying market rates for players that have reached free agency and their draft value has been expended. Data on first round draft picks and the WAR they have generated was collected from Baseball Reference.
 
I wanted the results here to reflect on the struggles from 2011-2014, so I intentionally didn’t go any further back than 2003 because those players had largely used up their first six years early in that period or before it. An argument could be made to include the 2002 class since most of the big names wouldn't have reached free agency until the 2013 season (Greinke, Hamels, Cain, BJ Upton), but I’ve excluded them. Note that this leaves out Denard Span from 2002 and Joe Mauer from 2001, both resounding successes of first-round picks.
 
With our time frame selected and the expected values defined, I tried to account for the fact that the more recent draft years are unlikely to have utilized all of their pre-free agency years by discounting the expected WAR for those more recent draft classes. The expected WAR in the first 6 years for the 2007-2011 draft classes were reduced by the following factors:
2011 = 1/6
2010 = 2/6
2009 = 3/6
2008 = 4/6
2007 = 5/6
This factoring isn’t perfect, as players come up at different rates, but the ratios of actual to expected WAR within the draft class stay reasonably steady at these rates. This discounting is actually a benefit for teams that have already gotten MLB production from these recent draft classes, which seems fine to me with our goal of assessing impact on the 2011-2014 seasons. We also might get some WAR from the older draft classes beyond their first 6 years. To adjust for this, I looked at the individual players in the 2003-2005 classes with more than 5 career WAR, looked up their stats on BRef and reduced their WAR by any amounts earned beyond 6 years (this sounds like a lot of work, but it was really only like 20 guys).
 
In looking through the data, I’m satisfied that we’re at least close enough to get a good gauge of team drafting performance. If you’ve made it this far, I’d be happy to share the Excel file with anyone interested (send me a PM with your email). I’ve also done some analysis specific to the Twins’ picks and whether or not they made it to MLB in relation to league averages, so I might follow up with that.
 
I hope the info here provides some help in assessing the Twins’ recent first round draft performance. Thanks in advance for your comments, insights and feedback.
 
Photo credit to Mizzou Media Relations

First, the results. Then, how in the heck I got them. We’ll use Wins Above Replacement (WAR) to assess how well the Twins have drafted in the first round from 2003 to 2011 compared to the rest of the league.
 
From 2003-2011, the Twins’ first-round picks were:
23rd in expected WAR per pick. This is an indication of their consistently low draft position due to successful teams and supplemental round picks.
15th in total expected WAR. The Twins make up ground here due to the additional picks they gained in the supplemental round as compensation for losing free agents.
19th in actual WAR generated. The Twins draft picks from 2003-2011 have produced WAR at a lower rate than the league average.
19th in pick efficiency. This most directly ties to “how well they drafted” after accounting for both draft position and total number of picks. I’m defining pick efficiency as the ratio of actual WAR to expected WAR.
 
This has certainly had an impact on the poor results we’ve seen out of the team from 2011-2014. Many other avenues of talent acquisition exist, but for teams like the Twins and many others, the acquisition of amateurs plays a large role. The draft goes much deeper than the first round, but failing to get significant production there can be quite the challenge to overcome.
 
It’s amazing how a Mike Trout or a Clayton Kershaw can make your team look good at first round draft picks, as seen by the Angels and Dodgers. The Red Sox did poorly from 2006 going forward as shown in Parker’s recent analysis, but they get credit for Jacoby Ellsbury and a few others here. The Diamondbacks did well, but traded away Scherzer, J. Upton and Stephen Drew – their top 3 performing picks. You might also notice a pretty strong correlation between the teams at the bottom of the list and the teams that have stunk in recent years. Sure would hate to be a Phillies fan – that organization has managed to get negative WAR out of their first rounds picks – yow-ouuch.
 
The Twins didn’t hit any homers with their first round picks in this timeframe. However, expectations needed to be tempered in the first place. They’ve underperformed even to that lowered standard, but this analysis doesn’t show them to be among the very worst either.
 
Smack-dab middle of the pack in total expected WAR + below average pick efficiency + trading away the draft pick that represented over a third of the actual WAR generated (Garza) for a terrible left fielder = very little visible MLB production for the Twins out of the 2003-2011 first round picks.
 


 
*****************
 
Now, for those so inclined, the approach.
 
Over the last decade, a number of extremely smart statistical researchers have explored the value of draft picks. I am not one of them. For simplicity, I decided to use the figures created by Andrew Ball (which are quite similar to others out there):
Tier 1 – Pick #1 Expected WAR = 11.83
Tier 2 – Pick #2 Expected WAR = 10.09
Tier 3 – Pick #3-7 Expected WAR = 5.37
Tier 4 – Pick #8-15 Expected WAR = 5.21
Tier 5 – Pick #16-30 Expected WAR = 2.65
Tier 6 – Pick #31-60 Expected WAR = 1.41
 
It is important to note that the expected WAR figures represent only the first 6 years of a player’s career. This is done with the expectation that teams are paying market rates for players that have reached free agency and their draft value has been expended. Data on first round draft picks and the WAR they have generated was collected from Baseball Reference.
 
I wanted the results here to reflect on the struggles from 2011-2014, so I intentionally didn’t go any further back than 2003 because those players had largely used up their first six years early in that period or before it. An argument could be made to include the 2002 class since most of the big names wouldn't have reached free agency until the 2013 season (Greinke, Hamels, Cain, BJ Upton), but I’ve excluded them. Note that this leaves out Denard Span from 2002 and Joe Mauer from 2001, both resounding successes of first-round picks.
 
With our time frame selected and the expected values defined, I tried to account for the fact that the more recent draft years are unlikely to have utilized all of their pre-free agency years by discounting the expected WAR for those more recent draft classes. The expected WAR in the first 6 years for the 2007-2011 draft classes were reduced by the following factors:
2011 = 1/6
2010 = 2/6
2009 = 3/6
2008 = 4/6
2007 = 5/6
This factoring isn’t perfect, as players come up at different rates, but the ratios of actual to expected WAR within the draft class stay reasonably steady at these rates. This discounting is actually a benefit for teams that have already gotten MLB production from these recent draft classes, which seems fine to me with our goal of assessing impact on the 2011-2014 seasons. We also might get some WAR from the older draft classes beyond their first 6 years. To adjust for this, I looked at the individual players in the 2003-2005 classes with more than 5 career WAR, looked up their stats on BRef and reduced their WAR by any amounts earned beyond 6 years (this sounds like a lot of work, but it was really only like 20 guys).
 
In looking through the data, I’m satisfied that we’re at least close enough to get a good gauge of team drafting performance. If you’ve made it this far, I’d be happy to share the Excel file with anyone interested (send me a PM with your email). I’ve also done some analysis specific to the Twins’ picks and whether or not they made it to MLB in relation to league averages, so I might follow up with that.
 
I hope the info here provides some help in assessing the Twins’ recent first round draft performance. Thanks in advance for your comments, insights and feedback.
 
Photo credit to Mizzou Media Relations

First, the results. Then, how in the heck I got them. We’ll use Wins Above Replacement (WAR) to assess how well the Twins have drafted in the first round from 2003 to 2011 compared to the rest of the league.
 
From 2003-2011, the Twins’ first-round picks were:
23rd in expected WAR per pick. This is an indication of their consistently low draft position due to successful teams and supplemental round picks.
15th in total expected WAR. The Twins make up ground here due to the additional picks they gained in the supplemental round as compensation for losing free agents.
19th in actual WAR generated. The Twins draft picks from 2003-2011 have produced WAR at a lower rate than the league average.
19th in pick efficiency. This most directly ties to “how well they drafted” after accounting for both draft position and total number of picks. I’m defining pick efficiency as the ratio of actual WAR to expected WAR.
 
This has certainly had an impact on the poor results we’ve seen out of the team from 2011-2014. Many other avenues of talent acquisition exist, but for teams like the Twins and many others, the acquisition of amateurs plays a large role. The draft goes much deeper than the first round, but failing to get significant production there can be quite the challenge to overcome.
 
It’s amazing how a Mike Trout or a Clayton Kershaw can make your team look good at first round draft picks, as seen by the Angels and Dodgers. The Red Sox did poorly from 2006 going forward as shown in Parker’s recent analysis, but they get credit for Jacoby Ellsbury and a few others here. The Diamondbacks did well, but traded away Scherzer, J. Upton and Stephen Drew – their top 3 performing picks. You might also notice a pretty strong correlation between the teams at the bottom of the list and the teams that have stunk in recent years. Sure would hate to be a Phillies fan – that organization has managed to get negative WAR out of their first rounds picks – yow-ouuch.
 
The Twins didn’t hit any homers with their first round picks in this timeframe. However, expectations needed to be tempered in the first place. They’ve underperformed even to that lowered standard, but this analysis doesn’t show them to be among the very worst either.
 
Smack-dab middle of the pack in total expected WAR + below average pick efficiency + trading away the draft pick that represented over a third of the actual WAR generated (Garza) for a terrible left fielder = very little visible MLB production for the Twins out of the 2003-2011 first round picks.
 


 
*****************
 
Now, for those so inclined, the approach.
 
Over the last decade, a number of extremely smart statistical researchers have explored the value of draft picks. I am not one of them. For simplicity, I decided to use the figures created by Andrew Ball (which are quite similar to others out there):
Tier 1 – Pick #1 Expected WAR = 11.83
Tier 2 – Pick #2 Expected WAR = 10.09
Tier 3 – Pick #3-7 Expected WAR = 5.37
Tier 4 – Pick #8-15 Expected WAR = 5.21
Tier 5 – Pick #16-30 Expected WAR = 2.65
Tier 6 – Pick #31-60 Expected WAR = 1.41
 
It is important to note that the expected WAR figures represent only the first 6 years of a player’s career. This is done with the expectation that teams are paying market rates for players that have reached free agency and their draft value has been expended. Data on first round draft picks and the WAR they have generated was collected from Baseball Reference.
 
I wanted the results here to reflect on the struggles from 2011-2014, so I intentionally didn’t go any further back than 2003 because those players had largely used up their first six years early in that period or before it. An argument could be made to include the 2002 class since most of the big names wouldn't have reached free agency until the 2013 season (Greinke, Hamels, Cain, BJ Upton), but I’ve excluded them. Note that this leaves out Denard Span from 2002 and Joe Mauer from 2001, both resounding successes of first-round picks.
 
With our time frame selected and the expected values defined, I tried to account for the fact that the more recent draft years are unlikely to have utilized all of their pre-free agency years by discounting the expected WAR for those more recent draft classes. The expected WAR in the first 6 years for the 2007-2011 draft classes were reduced by the following factors:
2011 = 1/6
2010 = 2/6
2009 = 3/6
2008 = 4/6
2007 = 5/6
This factoring isn’t perfect, as players come up at different rates, but the ratios of actual to expected WAR within the draft class stay reasonably steady at these rates. This discounting is actually a benefit for teams that have already gotten MLB production from these recent draft classes, which seems fine to me with our goal of assessing impact on the 2011-2014 seasons. We also might get some WAR from the older draft classes beyond their first 6 years. To adjust for this, I looked at the individual players in the 2003-2005 classes with more than 5 career WAR, looked up their stats on BRef and reduced their WAR by any amounts earned beyond 6 years (this sounds like a lot of work, but it was really only like 20 guys).
 
In looking through the data, I’m satisfied that we’re at least close enough to get a good gauge of team drafting performance. If you’ve made it this far, I’d be happy to share the Excel file with anyone interested (send me a PM with your email). I’ve also done some analysis specific to the Twins’ picks and whether or not they made it to MLB in relation to league averages, so I might follow up with that.
 
I hope the info here provides some help in assessing the Twins’ recent first round draft performance. Thanks in advance for your comments, insights and feedback.
 
Photo credit to Mizzou Media Relations

2011. The Year of the Injury. Nishioka. Bilateral leg weakness. 90+ losses.
2012. The Rebound That Wasn't. Brutal starting pitching. Marginal bullpen and offense.
2013. Stop the Pain. The farm is looking better, but the major league team isn't so major.
2014. TBD. On pace for 90 losses, the consensus seems to be that this year's team is easier to watch. The team has made moves to transition to the next generation of players.
 
This brings us to the question I've pondered and will try to answer:
How long does it take a team to rebuild and make the playoffs after a 90 loss season?
 


 
90 losses is bottoming out. It's bad. Since 1996 through 2010, we can find 36 instances of a team that lost 90 games and has either gone on to make the playoffs in a future year or is still trying -- looking at you, Royals. Some teams have done it more than once like the four-time Cubs while only two teams have avoided a 90 loss season -- the Yankees and Cardinals. Some teams lose 90 games and relive that pain multiple times. Other teams have rebounded quickly.
 
Number of seasons it takes to reach the playoffs after first losing 90 games:


 
 
Six of those teams are still adding to their streak of no playoffs since their first 90 loss season after the '95 strike: Royals (1985 in real life, represented as 1997 here), Blue Jays (2004), Mariners (2004), Marlins (2007), Padres (2008), Mets (2009).
 
We can come to a couple of interesting conclusions by looking at that chart:
 
1) If you don't rebound immediately after your 90 loss season, you probably need to rebuild.
This is pretty evident with the 2012 Twins. After a long playoff streak, it was reasonable for us all to think that 2011 might have been a blip. Turns out, no.
 
2) In this data set, the average rebuild to reach the playoffs takes 5.8 years. If we exclude the teams that rebounded after one bad year, that number goes up to 7 years.
The Twins are about to wrap year 3 since 2011's 90+ losses. We're certainly hopeful that the Twins reach the playoffs before 2017 or 2018, but it's feasible to think that could be the case as prospects continue to develop and grow into producers at the MLB level. The Twins appear pretty close to on track for "average" or just ahead.
 
Many of us would have liked the Twins to be more aggressive in acknolwedging the first conculsion. We'd all probably agree that the farm system has come a long way and the future holds hope. Hopefully, this data provides some insight on how long a rebuild takes across MLB and, therefore, provides something to compare our current rebuild against.
 
Obligatory Joe Mauer reference for free pizza.