tobi0040

Ahh, I was adding his 3 from yesterday. I didn't think they were updated.

You don't worry about stunting the development of a guy like Santana. But Kepler has had a whopping 14 PA in 9 games. If they would not keep him around and give him a shot, why even bring him up?

Are you saying some relief help this off-season may have made sense? Seemed like we had that covered.

Hard to argue with demoting a guy who is striking out 53% of the time. I am guessing Murphy and Duffey are swapped shortly

In 2009, Mark Reynolds set the single season mark with 223 strikeouts in a season. It should be noted that he hit 44 HR’s that year, had an OPS of .892 and finished 20th in the MVP voting. Here is quick look at some Twins pace given Reynolds 662 AB’s he had in 2009: Byron Buxton, on pace for 352 strikeouts (53.3% k rate). .497 OPS. Miguel Sano, on pace for 285 strikeouts (43.2% k rate). .766 OPS. Oswaldo Arcia, on pace for 245 strikeouts (37.1% k rate). .795 OPS. Park, on pace for 212 strikeouts (32.1% k rate). .853 OPS. Eddie Rosario, on pace for 172 strikeouts (26.1% k rate). .567 OPS. As a team, the 2013 Astros hold the all-time record of 1,535 strikeouts (25.5% rate). The Twins with their 24.4% rate would finish with 1,468 k’s with the same number of at bats. When I saw the 2013 Astros I thought, well the it worked out pretty well for them. They are good now, let’s stick with the young guys come hell or high water. But looking the 2013 team, very few of those hitters are part of the good young nucleus they have now. In fact, a 23 year old Jose Altuve was the only key guy that was among the top 8 in AB’s. He also struck out only 85 times in over 600 AB’s in 2013. My prediction is that the single season strikeout record will remain with the Astros, but Miguel Sano will set the individual record. I think Buxton will be spared by going back to AAA, which likely happens in the next week or two. He just is not putting up competitive at bats right now. It should be noted that Sano, Arcia, and Park have respectable if not good OPS numbers (Park especially). Given what Sano and Rosario did last year I stick with them up here. Sano could cut down on his swing a tad with two strikes and Rosario needs better plate discipline, but they should work that out with the Twins. The scary comparison is the 51 win 2013 Astros had an OPS of .674, in the same ballpark as the Twins .687. Now the Twins pitching this year has been much better (3.80 vs. 4.79), but the offensive numbers are alarming.

On my list of worries right now about the Twins, catcher depth is somewhere between 30 and 40. Catcher talent is in the top ten. If we need to find someone that can match the output of Murphy or Suzuki, we can probably find them.

Nice to see some of these names on here. Because the big club is not inspiring a ton of optimism

Pretty surprised we left Hicks unprotected. Nice to see Burdi back and pitching well. We need him and chargois

I sure hope Meyer is ahead of Duffey

Something has to change though. Buxton has played in two of the last four games.

I think he has 3-4 days before I send him down if he continues to have uncompetitive 3 pitch AB's

The lack of foresight over the last year or two has been just awful. Perkins declining and Jepsen pitching much better than reality last year. They don't sign anyone. Plouffe and Sano. The extra bodies around the rotation and tendering guys like Milone. The outfield defense with both Sano and Arcia in it. The log jam between OF, 1b, and DH and the Park signing.

When you look out at the spectrum of current production and ceiling, Plouffe is kind of an odd man out in my opinion. I am not saying the guy doesn’t have value. He had a WAR of 2.5 last year. But the .720 to .740 OPS is as good as it gets. Sano can do that hitting left handed. Again not sure if Park can play 3B, but his ceiling is higher than that. Rosario had a higher OPS at age 23, etc. But the odd thing is look at Ben Zobrist. His ability to move around has generated a ton of value around the league. He was traded on a rental for a kings ransom, then signed a 4 year, $56M deal as a free agent. Plouffe could be Zobrist-light. Give him 5-8 games at second, play a little first, play in a corner OF spot a bit. Zobrist had a negative dWAR last year, so it is not like he is some gold glover everywhere. Teams are just valuing flexibility. And while Zobrist has put up an OPS in the .800 range the last few years, if you took out 20-30 games for Plouffe against righties I bet his OPS climbs a bit. Both helping this team and increasing his trade value.

The time to trade Milone was in the off-season. Hey Tigers, instead of giving Mike Pelfrey 2 years and $16M, we can send you Tommy Milone who is on the hook for a year and $4.5M and controlled another two years. Interested?

The problem is this team is not winning the world series this year. We just aren’t. And Nolasco isn’t likely to keep this up. I mean the guy is 33 years old and has a career ERA+ of 91. So his mid 2’s ERA through 20 IP is probably not going to be sustained. We should have no qualms about trading him at all. And regarding Meyer needing a half of a year in AAA, the guy is 26 year old. Outside of 2015 his numbers were incredible and he already has 140 dominant innings in AAA under his belt. 2012 (low and high A) – 129 IP, 2.86 ERA, 9.7 k per 9. 2013 (AA) – 78 IP, 2.99 ERA, 11.5 k per 9. 2014 (AAA) – 130 IP, 3.52 ERA, 10.6 k per 9.

Spot on Mike. The second I saw us tender Milone, rather than trade him this was the obvious scenio. I would not at all be surprised to see Meyer join the pen, like May. I just wish these roster decisions were made with a lens on the next playoff team. The games 1-2 starters are more likely to be Meyer, Berrios, and May and not guys like Milone or Nolasco. So just get on with it.

I think you are not losing much in terms of upside by trading Milone yesterday. We need higher upside, better stuff guys if this ship is going to right itself in the next 1-4 years.

Interesting discussion. I touched on the number crunch in a recent blog. The Twins have a lot of worthy guys right now all over the roster with not enough spots.

This is something that I think eventually gets changed. The most important thing to me is getting the calls right. So much of the frustration in this game is completely un-necessary. Guys getting pissed about where the strike zone is, you called the pitch outside for them and not for us. The whole feeling out period every game to see “what the ump will give you”. And I think balls and strikes are an area where technology is going to get it right literally 99.99% of the time. The umps miss all the time. Unlike pass interference, this is more cut and dry. The plate width and player height are known. Pass interference is something where you need to make a judgement call. Some touching is allowed. If it is going both ways they usually don’t call it. If the ball was not catch-able they don’t call it, etc. Maybe some happy medium here is you still have a real grumpy old guy behind the plate with an earpiece. After each pitch the earpiece tells him ball or strike. If someone complains, he can still act like a child, freak out, start swearing and throw them out of the game.

Yeah, the most pressing issues are the outfield and rotation. Buxton and Sano, given their ceilings just need to play every day. That leaves Rosario, Kepler, and Arcia really rotating into one spot. In the rotation, the guys that need to be there are Berrios and Meyer. While still young, Berrios has kind of dropped the mic in the minors, the guy is crushing it and has very little to prove. Meyer has basically done the same thing (if you throw out 2015). So he has been less consistent, but he is 26 years old now. So it is time to bring him up and see what we have. As a franchise we just can’t have these two guys in AAA or the bullpen. They have upsides that easily exceed everyone else in the rotation. If the franchise turns the corner, it will be by replacing #4/#5 starters with #1 and #2 starters. I think we will see a decent amount of movement on the Twins roster between now and the deadline.

How did we get here? The 2011-2014 swoon led to a lot of high draft picks . And the losses forced the Twins to look into the future and move veterans like Span and Revere for prospects. While it is ideal for a rebuilding team to time when all their prospects reach the big show, it has worked out a little too nice for the Twins. We find ourselves with too many bodies than reps. And those bodies are guys that by and large don’t need any more time in AAA. The current situation: Outfield – You have five guys going for three spots. Buxton is the second best prospect in the game. Sano was on pace for 36 HR last year and would have been getting MVP votes had he played all year. Rosario had an OPS in the .760’s last year while leading the league in OF assists. Arcia has shown the ability to be a productive MLB player at a young age. And Max Kepler is a top three prospect in one of the better systems in the league. These guys are all young and need to play every day. Arguably, Kepler could go back to AAA and Buxton might need a tweak if he doesn’t improve. But those would be short term fixes and wouldn’t likely buy a ton of time. I don't think you want Sano and Arcia in the same outfield, so I would think either Sano moves to DH or 3B or Arcia is the odd man out. Infield – You have Mauer and Dozier entrenched at first and second. And even though we have a lot of bodies, Escobar is likely the only immediate answer at SS. And Plouffe has been one of our better players the last two years. At catcher, John Ryan Murphy is a guy we traded for Aaron Hicks. So the Twins believe in him and want to see him succeed. And same goes for Park at DH. He has shown promise thus far and has a four year deal. Guys who are on the cusp Starters - Berrios and Meyer are ripping up AAA. And Duffey is having a good year so far after a very strong debut last year. Outside of Berrios, these guys are not that young and need to get MLB reps. Relievers – The big three I would argue are Chargois, Burdi, and Melotakis. But you have some other names that could also force the Twins to make some decisions, like Rogers and Reed. Other position players – Jorge Polanco has put up pretty solid numbers the last few years. How do the Twins solve this? Trade Plouffe and move Sano back to 3B. This would be ideal, but it is unclear what the market for Plouffe looks like. In all fairness, it is also unclear whether the Twins feel that Sano could ever play 3B again. But this is a move that would definitely be a positive. Note: I would target relievers, promising prospects in A ball, and/or a catcher in all trades. Trade Dozier – On the surface this doesn’t seem like it helps a ton. But you slide Polanco to 2B and at the same time, move a guy that suddenly has a few red flags (and is owed about $30M). Trade Nolasco – He has always been tradeable, assuming the Twins pay his full salary to pitch somewhere else. My hope is that he continues to pitch well and maybe the amount of salary the other team will pick up gets down to a level Terry Ryan deems appropriate. To me this is a no-brainer. Trade Milone – He is controlled for another two years and has a pretty decent track record, although his peripherals have never been great. So hopefully a market exists for Milone. A large trade – Think of a two or three for one type trade involving some combo of Plouffe, Polanco, Arcia, Rosario, Gibson, and someone like Gonsalves for a clear upgrade like Sonny Gray or Alex Cobb. This is the type of move that I think the Twins should consider. Because the reality is of all the bodies we have right now, we have a ton of guys that are still prospects or unproven. Flipping a few of them for a talent upgrade that is close to a guarantee, while at the same time solving the number crunch seems like a win-win to me. Move Plouffe to a super utility role – This is also something that should be considered. Plouffe is what he is at this point. He is a .720-.740 OPS guy who is probably past his prime. He is also making $7-8M a year and only controlled another year. He can play 3B, 1B, and I think would be fine in LF or RF if need be. So you move him around a bit. He plays every day against lefties and about half the time against righties (this would likely improve his overall numbers). It would also be very nice to have this caliber of guy around in the event of an injury as well. This one is likely a long shot. But move Park to 3B and move Sano to DH (either trade Plouffe or moving him to a super utility role). Park has played 1B and the OF, so he should be able to take grounders as well as throw. But I have no read on whether this is possible. Just throwing it out there. Lastly, cut the weakest link from the pen, move Milone or Nolasco to the pen and bring up Meyer/Berrios/Duffey. The worst way forward in my opinion is not making any moves at all. This will stunt development of the very key players this franchise is counting on (by keeping them in AAA too long or by not playing everyday for the Twins). Well, what say you? What is the best path forward for the Twins?

Yup. We needed two arms. More of the same in Rochester.

3.27 ERA last year with 9.3 k per 9. Time for a modest promo to AAA Don't really care about his 5.5 BB per 9 last year. Our pen is at 5 this year. We need better stuff up here.

He very well could be. I am willing to let Milone and Nolasco give it a rip in the pen. As I see it, the best pen addition this year will be Chargois, but he has a total of 5 IP in AA. So probably not imminent.

If we go back and look at all the balls and strikes, I am guessing the Twins have not been any more hosed than the other teams. The games I have seen have been extremely inconsistent on both sides. Time to let the machines do the work, versus having a human make a call, then immediately use the machine to show the viewers how wrong the call was. And at the same time we can get rid of the ridiculous "the ump is giving away today, or low and outside". The two innings it takes to figure out what the rules of the day are. Our pen is struggling because we don't have good pitchers in it. The "top 3" guys have had 6 good outings out of 15. I expect the hitting to get better, but the pen should not really improve. It will be a tragedy if guys like Berrios or Meyer are moved back there this year because TR didn't make any moves. Those two should be replacing Nolasco and Milone.