Doomtints

[ What the heck is "Twins Daily"? ]

Clearly I did look at the data as I pointed out that what I was talking about (RF) is not the same as whatever RZR is. In order to do that, I had to look at RZR. The person who could not be bothered to look anything up is the person on the other end of the transaction. I looked at both metrics. For some reason you are coming into this conversation with a bias without properly reading the thread. Not sure what the point is other than to drag it out. I think the two of us have already moved on.

Of course fangraphs is reliable. No one said it wasn't. But RZR is not RF. RZR, as far as I can tell, is the component of UZR that is used for range.

I did not tell him to look up the data. I told him to look up the fact that what he thought was RF was not RF. I had already told him it wasn't, and he chose to argue rather than check.

There are some guys on this list who have some real upside.

Looking at BP's metrics on Castro, they show him as below average for throwing and blocking, which is confirmed by the metrics you'll find anywhere else. For 2016, they show him as having saved 17 runs (a career high) with his pitch framing which I don't think would amount to 0.22 ERA among the whole staff -- perhaps 0.02. Comparing to Suzuki, Castro is a huge drop off for blocking but otherwise he is an improvement. So as long as Berrios, May, etc., can find the strike zone this year, Castro will be an upgrade defensively. Neither of them are good at throwing, but Castro is better. I would call Suzuki the "safer" catcher, good to pair up with a wild pitcher. Castro is the guy you want paired with your top starters. He can get that extra strike out of an umpire if the umpire is already liking who is on the mound. With the current Twins pitching situation I'm not sold on Castro being the answer. As for his bat, Castro has more potential than Suzuki, but at the end of the day the results from the both of them are a bit even with Castro being good at some things and Suzuki being equally good at other things. Castro could have a break out year though. Suzuki's break out year is behind him.

RF is available for minor league stats so SSS isn't an issue. Even if you don't trust the minors stats for some reason, RF is considered trustworthy after half a season as opposed to 3 years for UZR. RF is far from an uberstat. You can't use it for first basemen, for example. But it's a good stat for looking at other position players who haven't been in the majors for three full years yet. I look at RF for rookies or players with tiny MLB sample sizes. I use Total Zone for seasons with at least 100 starts at a position because I think it's important to be able to compare players from any era. I look at the UZR suite only casually. I love looking at Statcast data but like everybody else I feel it's hard to get one's head around. Plus it seems spotty/difficult to access fully. As far as Adrianza goes, I think the Twins probably see something they can correct with his bat because he spreads it around and makes good contact. The results just haven't been there for him. With more walks he can be an everyday player even if he can't hit for power. His defense is an upgrade, average-to-above-average. He has a lot of potential to be a good backup player as his floor.

Umpiring has improved since pitch framing became a thing. It shows an umpire's tendencies just as much as it shows a catcher's. The crappier umpires don't like pitch framing one bit, but many of them have gotten better because of it.

Yeah. Guy blows out his arm and loses a year trying to throw from 3B. Guy has balls bounce off the top of his head while fielding at 3B. Sano has no value as a defender, and if he gets injured while fielding then you've just lost his bat. Why risk that when the bat is all you care about?

"Injury prone" is a strong term that I would not use to describe Buxton, at least not yet. Still, I would not have the expectation for him to play a full season. He still has not been good for more than a month at a time and he has had some injuries. He would be a guy who I would rest every two weeks, at least in 2017. If he gets injured or suffers through another a long slump he isn't helping anybody. If he plays 135 games in 2017, then you can push for 155 next year.

He has to both stay healthy and hit well enough. Both have been elusive for him so far. Considering his history, if I were in charge I don't think I'd even want him out there 155 games yet.

I'm not concerned with the CF defense either, though I would be surprised if Buxton plays 155 games out there.

I think the Ryan II-era Twins proved very well how important good CF defense is. Without Aaron Hicks out there the defense was costing them games. Unfortunately, with him out there his bat was costing them games....

I think improving the defense is a great first step. I disagree that Castro's defense is good, but I like the premise in this article that shoring up the defense is a priority. Unfortunately there are limited things the Twins can do defensively as there are some big bats they want to keep in the lineup, bats that are attached to some rather iffy defenders. In any case, improving defense + improving starting pitching could be done concurrently....

Weird. You're fighting rather than looking it up? RZR is not range factor. This is range factor. You won't find it on fangraphs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Range_factor Fangraphites don't like range factor because you cannot compare people who play different positions with it. You can only compare 1B to 1B, 2B to 2B, etc. Therefore you can't roll it up into an advanced metric like UZR. But you CAN use it to compare a SS to other shortstops.

That's not range factor if you are referring to the highlighted column.

If someone wants to claim Jim Hoey Light, let 'em. If the Twins lose any sleep over that one they are off their meds.

I don't think the Twins were fooled. His numbers were not impressive with the Sox either. The Twins simply decided to take the gamble.

Too small of a sample size to use UZR or even Total Zone. Just use Range Factor for now.

Cutting Jim Hoey Light should have been the first order of business. Now when someone inevitably name drops Jim Hoey when complaining about Twins mistakes, we now have someone worse to point them to. The quicker we forget about Hoey the quicker his face can be erased from my mind. Thanks, Pat, for lowering the bar so the Twins community can move on. Good move all around.

The sample size with this one is very small. The Twins might think they see something that no one else does. He spreads the ball around when he hits and he makes good contact, even if the results aren't impressive. He needs to draw more walks to be the OBP guy that he needs to be in order to succeed. He has no power. As far as defense is concerned, he looks about average. We can be optimistic and hope that the same underling who was making these weird marginal moves under the previous regime is not still making them, and that there IS something to see with this guy.

But wait, don't we hear often that the hitting is fine?

The Twins could have spent this time evaluating other talent that could fill a position of need. There weren't just two options -- spending time evaluating Park or hovering around the margarita machine in the front office. A pretty good third option would be spending time evaluating pitching talent. And this third option probably should have been the first option. A logjam can also prevent the team from ever being able to figure out who can perform at a major league level. I think many of us predicted this exact thing would happen last year when Park was signed -- either Vargas or Park would get cut without being properly evaluated.

Tonkin wasn't overworked. He had a good April and the rest of the year was pointless (or worse). He put up his best pitching numbers with 0 days off and worst numbers with 2-5 days off. The most telling split for Tonkin is that he pitched well against teams with a sub-.500 record and was terrible against teams with a .500 record or more. He is still young and will adjust if he deserves to be in the majors.

It's interesting seeing the idea of 3 catchers batted around. Gardenhire/Ryan had 3 catchers on the roster quite often and fans were very critical of them for it.