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Doomtints

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Everything posted by Doomtints

  1. Doomtints
    Not necessarily. But I am saying that if someones FP% is terrible, you don't have to bother looking at anything else. You know by that alone that he is terrible. You only need to look at other things like Total Zone or UZR if the player's FP% is near average or better. You can't completely discount FP%.
  2. Doomtints
    Very true. I'll take it a step beyond that and say that FP% should always be Exhibit A when judging defense. If someone refuses to even look at FP%, he or she will never understand a player's defense. Essentially, if FP% is far below average for the position, you need not look any further to know the player is bad at the position. You don't have to bother looking at 'advanced' metrics if the FP% is laughable. You only need to look at the other metrics if FP% looks fine.
  3. Doomtints
    For me, the eyeball test doesn't look tragic for Polanco. His reaction time is fine. For positioning, often he is in the right position both for fielding hits and for covering the bag. He doesn't have to move much to do either task. His throwing accuracy is fine but he is slow to release the ball. However, he could certainly be taking his time because he can see where the baserunner is. Good players don't rush the throw when there is no reason to. I haven't seen a play where he has had to throw the ball quickly, though at least one such play surely has happened. Long story short -- we haven't seen enough of him out there to know.
  4. Doomtints
    The best defensive metrics that come out of Statcast are arm strength (velocity & accuracy of throws), exchange (time between fielding and throwing), and first step (reaction time). These three things can be reliable with very small samples. Realize, however, that these three things are what we all measure with the "eyeball test." So how does Polanco LOOK out there? Are his throws accurate? Does he react quickly? Does he field and throw quickly? Many of the other Statcast stats are very raw, are measuring things that really say the opposite of what we expect (e.g., the player showing the highest average range is actually a guy who is playing out of position). For the most part, statcast provides "averages" and raw data (which can be analyzed by looking at "best plays" and "worst plays" by a player). The defensive metrics are hard to find mostly because they are so raw and because they use unweighted averages which are misleading. For this stuff, you still need big sample sizes. Statcast routing data is simply a computer computing distance from point A (the fielder) and point B (where the ball is fielded). It's a two-dimensional computation that is currently too basic. It's not much better than what we already have easy access to. Offensive and pitching statcast data can be found with some hunting around and this is where statcast really shines.
  5. Doomtints
    It actually does look a bit like a deliberate tank, doesn't it? Beresford? Come on....
  6. Doomtints
    MacPhail would be the first to tell you that you need a mix of young guys and veterans. You need free agents to field a competitive team. Shannon Stewart was seasoned when he came in. He wasn't a core player? The Twins players of that era might disagree with that. Mauer isn't a core player? The current Twins will disagree. "Core players" are guys you build around, sure, but their ages should be a mixture of young guys and veterans. With your philosophy the Twins would be rebuilding every year. Kind of like what they have been doing....
  7. Doomtints
    He's not trying to win games. Beresford is in the majors simply because he's a nice guy and the Twins want to give him a taste of the big leagues before the next GM comes in. Albers is playing with the team for the same reason, I'm guessing. I have no clue what this team is doing right now, but trying to win isn't it. It seems like they are clinging tight to their "Minnesota Nice/We're a Famly, GoshDarnit" philosophy until the very end.
  8. Doomtints
    Puckett used to make those throws, and Puckett was the reason Molitor came to the Twins. Molitor can go and coach the Brewers if he has some other idea of how defenders should act. The Twins have had outfielders doing that since the 80s. As for Rosario, is it really surprising that he's not the bust some people want him to be? He is still young and learning, and when he was striking out all the time at the start of the year, so was everyone else on the team. The entire team was getting bad advice.
  9. Doomtints
    The Twins front office under Ryan has avoided doing anything unconventional. They failed to realize that if they did something unconventional and it worked out, they would look like geniuses. With Sano they can sew up the DH position for the next fifteen years. Who cares if it's not normal for someone his age to be a full time DH? Boston happily took that deal with Ortiz. How many trips to the DL might Ortiz have taken if he fielded regularly?
  10. Doomtints
    Yep. Don't give 6 year contracts to 31/32 year olds. I would have worded that a bit differently, instead of a "sustained decrease in numbers" I would have said that, by age 32, a player's WAR would expected to be around half of their peak WAR ... and it gets worse from there. There is a flaw in the data but I don't fault the person who compiled it. He should have excluded pitchers who are out of the league early. A big reason the age 26-28 pitching WAR is so high is because there are more pitchers in the league at those ages. We are only concerned with top tier pitchers who have long careers. Having the shorter career guys in the mix skews the younger years higher. Still, it's a nice effort. Unfortunately it's difficult to give long contracts to pitchers under 28/29, as that's the age they tend to first hit free agency. Scherzer, the noted late bloomer, is an exception. (His contract is exceptional anyway as much of his salary is deferred until he is in his upper 40s). It's a reasonable risk to give a long contract to a 28 year old and expect a decent return.
  11. Doomtints
    This is one aspect I would agree with "the Twins way." That's too many contracted years for that age. Let the other teams do that. However, the Twins would have been smart to grab the top tier 28 year olds for the same price.
  12. Doomtints
    Many of those examples are entering their peak years (27/28), so those make sense. Scherzer is a bit of a late bloomer so his signing I can understand (though I would not have done it). David Price is the one true exception on your list who I also would have chased after. Look, there is always going to be a team dumb enough to give an older pitcher a long contract based on a guy performing very well in his contract year. This doesn't mean it's smart to do. It doesn't even really mean it's the market rate. Very likely other teams were offering, as I said, something close to 3 years considering his age, which is why he ended up on a small market team and not a team expected to compete. Just because there are a couple of teams willing to extend contracts to get the guy they really want doesn't change what I said.
  13. Doomtints
    It's not. How often does a 31/32 year old get a 6-year contract, at any position? Contracts like that happen for people on pace for the hall of fame, sure. Is that Zack Greinke? The $/yr makes sense. The length does not. 6/8 year contracts are for players entering their peak years, not players exiting them.
  14. Doomtints
    I'm actually not understanding this article. A cautionary tale that the Twins should not follow the path of the Diamondbacks? Isn't that what the Twins have done? Like the Diamondbacks, the Twins have expensive pitching contracts that did not work out. The problems for both teams, as they stand today, are the same problems: starting pitching. In spite of Greinke's stellar 2015 numbers, the dude is 32 years old. No respectable GM would have given him the contract he was given unless his specialty is a knuckle or curve, which isn't the case here. No sensible team gives Zack Greinke, at his age, a 6-year contract. Other offers on the table were probably all for three years. So you have the Diamondbacks who gave one guy who was about to start his decline a huge contract. You have the Twins who gave four guys with questionable track records market-to-above market contracts. As for which was worse, I would call it a tie. Both teams spent a lot of money on garbage. At least the Diamondbacks didn't block better pitchers from coming in by filling the staff with, well, filler, like the Twins did.
  15. Doomtints
    Depends on the player, but yeah Dozier isn't a guy who can carry the team. A good comp here is Pierzynski/Mauer. Pierzynski was a good player for his position. The Twins moved him because they had a better player coming up in the same position. The Twins cleaned up and had a nice run. Pierzynski went on and had a great career, too. The Twins have the same opportunity with Dozier/Polanco. If the new front office does not make this move it is not a good sign.
  16. Doomtints
    The majority of Twins fans seemed to underestimate Dozier at the beginning, calling his first season a "fluke" and predicting a "regression." His power was no mirage and he proved the naysayers wrong. My opinion on Dozier is that he is a solid guy to build a team around. He never seemed like a "leader" in that he's not the guy you need to lift up young guys. But he is a good, dependable player who has a lot of power. Dozier is a great contributor but not a leader. On the right team with the right lineup he is an extremely dangerous hitter. On a team not filled with such players, maybe not so much ... as his three home runs in a 5-run loss yesterday can attest. Let's be realistic, though. As far as his power goes, this is probably his peak year. Waiting in the wings, we have Polanco. I am extremely high on Polanco, I fully expect him to be as good as Dozier offensively and an upgrade defensively. This is a gift-wrapped opportunity to move a good player and fill a different hole. Dozier can go off to a team like the Yankees and continue to have a good career and the Twins can still be improved by losing him. This could be a true win-win trade.
  17. Doomtints
    Actually, trading Santana seems like a TR move. Trade him without doing anything to address the hole it causes. Sign a washed-up player to replace Santana who is worth about 50 cents and act like it was a successful move when the player performs at a 55 cent level. Meanwhile the other teams will use that $1 player like Santana, who sure might perform at the 90 cent level instead, and beat the Twins with their 55 cent players every day of the week. If the Twins actually could solve a logjam at SP by trading Santana, then sure let him go. But the Twins will still have Hughes, so they will be keeping the worse option. Also, there are no young players ready to step in for Santana. It was mentioned by someone that the A's found success by trading older players for younger ones. Sure, but they were SMART about it. When the A's were good at this, they didn't create holes by their trades. They had someone ready to step in. They traded for others who could fulfill the role. Who the heck are the Twins going to trade Santana for that would not be a net loss to the team? The team's holes are too cavernous for this trade to fix.
  18. Doomtints
    Trading Dozier can make sense, as it helps clear up a potential logjam as Polanco can step in. They can trade from a position of strength/depth and use that to plug another hole. Tradnig Santana makes less sense. It would make the team worse, it would serve nothing but to move a hole somewhere else. Moving someone like Santana was the sort of thing that got the Twins into this mess.
  19. Doomtints
    Repeat what was already done and did not work? Trading Santana would just mean having to trade for some other pitcher to replace him later on. There is no one available who can step into his shoes. I also don't know who would trade a pitcher for a catcher or vice-versa.
  20. Doomtints
    Sounds like a good solution is to not use WAR. Let's face it, no one needs WAR. The other stats are ample for getting a picture of a player. WAR/OPS+/ERA+/wRC+/FIP all fluctuate by year (and thus era), so just use stats that don't fluctuate if you want to make a comparison. You can also make your own stats if you see a gap. Personally I love OPS+ and ERA+ but I freely recognize that they can't be used for comparing players in different eras. There's nothing wrong with everyone using the same care and avoiding WAR and FIP in this situation, which I admit might sound sacrilegious as WAR and FIP are the flavors of our generation.
  21. Doomtints
    Planning to fail. Failing to plan.
  22. Doomtints
    Actually, Sano's RF numbers are better than Cuddyer's were. Look it up, yo.
  23. Doomtints
    No. The director position would be strategic. The GM and his assistants would be the people running around executing the strategy. This is dividing one position into two.
  24. Doomtints
    Why are you yelling at me?
  25. Doomtints
    #1 2016 bust - Nunez. He has been off the roster for quite some time now. What a slacker! Not a fan.
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