old nurse

In Parker's time period the Twins drafted players between picks 14 and 50 in the first round. Of those 11 picks 4 have made it to the major leagues and have produced positive bWAR. Of the 222 players drafted in that time frame in those slots 67 have made it to the majors and have produced positive bWAR. From that standpoint the Twins do not look bad. Over that time period 27 players in that group have produced at least 4 bWAR, the Twins drafted one. Again,for those players drafted. The Twins sucess rate was about average. Unfortunately, they needed to do better than average. They needed to be lucky and get a very good player, 7 over that time period have produced a bWAR greater than 10, and they did not.

How do the statistics change if you throw out the supplemental first round players? Some years there were 14 supplemental players, some years 34. What is a first rounder one year is a second rounder another

It is pretty much out of the shortstop's control if there is someone on base so the put out is a DP or not. The higher the % of plays a shortstop makes that are a DP could indicate there is a groundball pitcher or pitchers who put a lot of runners on base. I don't think it reflects on the shortstop. If there is a baserunner and there is a play involving the shortstop, be it put out or being in the middle of the double play, the % should be near 100 for success rate.

He wa GM, not president of baseball operations. Howard Fox was between Griffith and Bell. I kind of recall Fox was not in the scouting department

Point of clarification please. Jerry Bell headed the sports facility comission before working for the Twins. Wouldn't Calvin Griffith have been the last baseball person to run the Twins?

Players seem to prefer to havedefined roles. Closer, set up, 7th inning. That is why Perkins gets mentally ready for any 9th inning that matters in a Twins game. I would have imagined Swarzak was gettting ready to go anytime a couple of the pitchers no longer with the team started. Not everybody is wired to ake an undefined riole. Maybe it is easier for Fein to pitch to the 4-5-6 hitters in the 8th inning than the 7-9 hitters in the 9th. Through the years there have been few people that I know could work with undefined roles. There have been attempts to try closer or bullpen by committee yet few last the season.

Except for when he started, Stauffer has not pitched 60 innings in a season. It does build a case for not overusing your bullpens as perhaps the decline is as much due to overuse as age

The title said "attitude gap" When you look back at the Tom Kelly Twins it was said that no one worked harder than they did. They did extra. Sometimes I get the impression that the team has lost that. Fundamentals, basics, repetitions. Perhaps Hunter is a throwback to that time as he came up when some were still here he had that kind of work ethic. It is not 100% on the field, it is the 100% off the field that may be missing. According to baseball edge 381of some degree of catchable balls were hit to RF. 55 ended up not caught. They did, according to Inside Edge, lead the league in 0% balls caught in RF. Hunter was better in geting to balls that they thought a RF should get to. He did not get to any that were not in range. I Hunter probably knows how to play the hops, angles and back up the cf better. I do not know if it will make it a wash have a better outcome when the ball is bouncing out there. Back in the day the Twins were a low revenue team, low budget team. I don't really care what Ryan did then. It is a different set of circumstances now,. Free agent compensation is different. The Twin's revenue stream is different. The 2011 team that Ryan took over had 14 players making over 2 mill a year. Only Baker and Cuddyer were worth the money. He doesn't want to get in that situation again. The stats projectiion guys must have shown him some worth for the Hunter contract.

Due dialagence would be an MRI. While thre would be a debate over if any pitcher has a normal UCL after a while, Sanatana should have 3 MRIs in the last three years with KC, Atlanta and now the Twins. If three were changes they would have been spotted.

In response to the fangraphs article. Hughes K% is fine, Nolasco's career average for K% is fine at 19% Santana has a career K % of 18.9 Trevor May, if he is the 5th starter has a career so far of 20.9. Kyle Gibson's for the season sucked, but looks (apologies if my eyes are bad on the eye test, I took off the rose colored glasses first) as if improved over the second half from the first. Corera, Deduno and Swarzak are gone as well as Pino. They all contributed mightily to the low part of the curve. The chart had the avege IP of Twins starters at less than 120 IP. If the average IP of the first 5 starter are 170 and the replacements are Milone (15.9% career k%) or Meyer (27% or better in the upper minors) the Twins' starters should have a representative K% What appears worse is the bullpen K%. May they bring in 4 beter pitchers

A bounceback sort of year for Nolasco would be similar to the year Wilson had last year in a bad year

If his NY experience was that bad and his experience here that good it would not be unreasonable for him to sign an extension.

Shane Robinson is AAA filler. A backup disaster plan in case Polanco isn't ready as a plan C.

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=rf&stats=fld&lg=all&qual=y&type=3&season=2014&month=0&season1=2014&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0 I don't know quite what to make of the numbers. Yes Hunter is at the bottom of the list. Compared to average numbers it looks like Hunter did't get to about 6-7 balls all season that an average or above average outfielder would have. Expand the list out and you find for the time he was out there, Parmelee played an above average RF.

Player 3 was Willingham?

Inherited runners scored Anthony Swarzak P MIN 16 Brian Duensing P MIN 13 Michael Tonkin P MIN 6 Runners stranded Brian Duensing P MIN 28 Anthony Swarzak P MIN 19 Michael Tonkin P MIN 16 Runs allowed Anthony Swarzak P MIN 48 Brian Duensing P MIN 20 Michael Tonkin P MIN 13 Why Swarzak is looking for employment, Tonkin went to the minors and Duensing should be nervous

What does age start? You look at every other factor and where that person fits on a generic age curve gets thrown out. Parmelee could OPS and play the field pretty much how he has been playing until he is 40. It is not going to happen. If his level of play doesn't improve, he will be out of the league by 30 because there will be somebody cheaper with more upside come along or they were not very good in the first place and got their shot.. From the last few years Twins alone Johnson, Darnell, Thompson Achter, Mastroiani, Nunez, Fryer, Hermann, Florimon, Thomas, Ramirex, Diaomond, Pedro Hernandez, Martis, Tyler Robertson, Albers, Walters, Komatsu, Nisihioka, Luke Hughes, DeVries, Matt Maloney, Manhip, Waldrop, Vasquez, Grey, Burnett, and Perdoma are all highly unlikely to be in a major league uniform when they are 31. They all count against that age curve. You would be hard pressed to say they were out of the league because their skills declined with age. Their skills did not develop further to keep them on a roster. Valencia, Alexi Casilla, Hicks, Pinto, Shaffer, Parmelee and Escobar could all fit that model.

Yes. The age curves are different. They do not mean much. What an individual does can be far different than the average. Would you say you shouldn't extend an outfielder multiple years past the age of 33? You would say makes sense to do one year at a time for a Josh Willingham in hindsight. Torri Hunter on the other hand. produced multiple years past 33. Age alone doesn't mean much. Similar batters by age to Plouffe at 28 are Dave Hollins and Jose Batista. Their career paths from 28 are very divergent. Average for age means nothing.

Do you do single factor analysis in complex situations?

As a guide that is about as accurate as a defensive metric there is decline with age. How much decline is going to vary with each individual. There is nothing definitive about an aging curve. Yes there is an average line there. How wide is the spread of the data plots? As Plouffe has an injury history, it would be more likely for him to be below the curve. If he trains well, eats well, etc, that could bring him above the curve. Dozier plays a position that see wear and tear. Again, there are factors that push above or below the line. What skills age faster? Are those the skills that these guys rely on? Age alone means little.That should be evident from the curves from 2 different eras.

Sveum played only a some games at 2b. After he missed a season with injury he was never the same player, either. Dozier has had 2 years above average play at 2b. Even being inconsistent will make you an above average 2b. Neither is enough to say sign Dozier to a long term contract. 28 and how many years of team control versus the life expectancy of a MI remaining good without chemical preservatives?

This is where the analytics department comes into play. Is there going to be more of an improvement in his offense. If yes then sign

Since I have been called demented on this board a time or two, help me out here. When has there ever been a front loaded contract outside of the Cardinals? The only reason to frontload a Dozier contract is to trade him long before the contract is up.

If they could extend Zimmerman you have a brilliant idea. I would say that is a huge if.

Consider if Santana became league average for AL shortstops the last 5 seasons in BB%(6%) and K% (slightly less than 17%). He would be striking out less, but walking more. In a 400 AB season, it would result in about 16 more balls in play. That would not be enough to offset regression. On the other hand, if his 2013 AA season was indicative of what Santana could do, BA .297, K% 16, BB% 4.1 his BABIP was .353 Less strikouts, but also less walks. Thus it ofsets regression of his BABIP if while stiking out less, he also gets less bases on balls