Search the Community

Thankfully this offseason we don’t have Major League Baseball owners delaying the start of 2023 through a lockout, but if you can think back to 2021 when that was the reality, an interesting proposal was made. Reporting from The Athletic’s Evan Drellich and Ken Rosenthal highlighted a desire for the league to do away with the current arbitration system. The plan was to instead calculate bonuses and increases for player salaries based on accumulated WAR from any given season. As things stand currently, teams have control over players for six years. They don’t become arbitration eligible immediately, and therefore are only offered salary increases based on the assessed league minimum. This is why players pushed so hard for increased pay, given so many are not rewarded with substantial draft bonuses. A player may work their way through the minor leagues making less than minimum wage, and then never see a true payday until years into their big league career (that’s if they make it that far). The problem with using Fangraphs’ WAR valuation to determine paychecks is that baseball owners are then placing importance on an outside entity to control the livelihood of their workforce. It seems counterproductive to players, as they would no longer be able to argue in favor of themselves based on other production, and WAR is biased in terms of creating value for relievers or starting pitchers in conjunction with those that play every day. In The Athletic’s report it said, “Agreeing to a system that keeps the best players under team control, and at a set scale of pay, for potentially a longer period of time than six years — the current time it takes to get free agency — could lessen those players’ earnings in the long run. And, if the top-earning players in the sport don’t have a way to grow their salaries, then other players’ salaries also might not grow over time.” While that didn’t ultimately come to pass in the newly agreed to CBA, Major League Baseball has now introduced a new statistic. Enter aWAR. Currently there is bWAR, which alludes to Baseball Reference’s calculation, and fWAR, which alludes to Fangraphs. aWAR, as described by MLB, is a straightforward average of the two numbers. It is literally defined as “average of fWAR and bWAR.” The immediate problem here is the nuance. Neither calculation is the same because both companies weigh certain aspects of performance differently. A player could be seen better by one or the other, and therefore have that as a negotiating tactic to their advantage. With this being sent out in a memo as an official statistic, MLB has effectively sought to implement their WAR proposal within the constraints of arbitration. As players look to file at a higher number than their team may view them worthy, the argument on the team’s side can be made officially around the concepts of an accepted aWAR statistic. Of course team’s could’ve done this on their own previously, but it would’ve been a hypothetical suggestion with no one having to adhere to the aWAR principal. It will be interesting to see how writers utilize this new statistic, and how much we hear about during the upcoming arbitration cycle. It’s certainly not nothing that the league introduced this statistic in advance of those discussions for teams and players in 2023, and that can’t be something seen as favorable for the MLBPA. There doesn’t seem to be a reason that aWAR would be advertised on either Baseball Reference or Fangraphs sites as it would counteract the reason to have their own statistic featured prominently, and would provoke a reason to consult the other entity. Either way, this seems like the league saying one of those things they do but shouldn’t say out loud. Let’s see how this goes. What do you think?

Right now, baseball continues to suggest that a full season is going to take place whenever play resumes. While that’s a great though, and obviously what would favor the almighty dollar, any logistical hurdles that would impose seem certain to have other ideas. With there only being so many teams in warm weather portions of the country, and a 2021 season to consider on the back end, some sort of alternative schedule would seem to make sense. In digging through what the Twins have planned for 2020, there are 18 games scheduled against the National League. Of the 162 games played during 2019, 47% of them were against divisional opponents. Adjusting for travel and removing what could be deemed non-essential contests, interleague opponents could quickly be wiped off the map this year. With divisional races often being tightly contested, it would stand to reach that playing that same volume remain imperative. A year ago, Rocco Baldelli’s club played the AL Central to the tune of a 50-26 record (.658 winning percentage). The Chicago White Sox have taken steps forward, while the Cleveland Indians have taken steps backwards. It’s mainly status quo at the bottom of the grouping, but Kansas City and Detroit should be expected to take plenty of lumps regardless of who is in the other dugout. We’re in uncertain times to be sure, and no one really knows when baseball will return. Soon doesn’t appear to be a good descriptor though, and that leaves any number of things on the table. Maybe a year in which only division games are player, or some construction of around 100 games makes sense. At any rate, some baseball would be better than none at all. I recently touched on how the timelines of players like Byron Buxton and Rich Hill could be impacted by this delay. Certainly, having them healthy for a new Opening Day would be more ideal than not. The flip side could be losing a substantial portion of what may be Nelson Cruz’s final contributions. Outside of the individual impact though, we can turn back to that nuance lost by playing a shortened campaign. Fangraphs recently ran simulations utilizing ZiPS to provide context to what impact may be felt in a diminished season. Gone is the opportunity to run away and hide at that top, and what is generally a marathon turns into an all-out sprint. Heading into what was scheduled for 2020, the Twins owned a Postseason probability of 75.4% (5th highest in the game). Shrink the schedule to 110 games and that drops to 63.4%. If we’re talking about a June or July start, something like an 81-game schedule could commence, and that scenario has Minnesota’s odds to make the Postseason at just 55.5%. That’s a significant 19% drop and more importantly is an amount eaten up by the competition. With less variables in play it’s the fringe teams that find themselves in the most ideal position to benefit. When looking at Postseason percentage gains, AL Central foe Chicago is third highest in baseball at just north of 16%. Even the Kansas City Royals go from being non-factors to having a 14% probability of playing after the regular season. If this division was the Twins to lose in the year ahead, it certainly becomes much easier for them to do so without much room for error. Again, we aren’t yet in a place where we know what tomorrow looks like much less how October or November baseball may play out. What we do know is that once the first pill is delivered in 2020, there will be an immense amount of pressure to make sure every result acted upon with a high level of execution. MORE FROM TWINS DAILY — Latest Twins coverage from our writers — Recent Twins discussion in our forums — Follow Twins Daily via Twitter, Facebook or email

A few weeks ago I stumbled across a post at Fangraphs.com that tried to explain why Brian Dozier was suddenly hitting every pitch 600 feet. It is something that Fangraphs does all the time. If there is a change in a player’s performance guys like Eno Sarris, Jeff Sullivan and August Fagerstrom do an excellent and thorough job of breaking down the ins-and-outs through stats and video. Occasionally when they are writing about a Twins player, they miss or overlook something that the local followers are aware of. It comes with the territory of trying to cover all 30 teams. This particular Dozier write-up was more geared for the roto reader -- those into fantasy baseball -- but the post dove head-long into a mechanical breakdown of Dozier swing. Based on this assessment, Sport Illustrated’s Jay Jaffe picked it up and used it as a part of his analysis in explaining why Dozier has been Baseball Jesus over the last few months. "[T]he 29 year old Dozier has done impressive damage thanks to an in-season mechanical adjustment," Jaffe wrote. Since many readers here also read a lot of Fangraph articles and writers like Jaffe, I figured I would take the time to make it clear what is and is not happening. As a preface, the author of the post is not wrong, per se. Fangraphs.com’s Scott Strandberg recognized that Brian Dozier has made some changes at the plate. There are some tweaks that are easily seen between his April stance and his August stance. It’s just that the conclusion is a bit off. The first change that Strandberg observed is that Dozier has indeed altered his pre-swing movements, adding a much more exaggerated bat tip prior to getting his hands back. You can easily see the differences in motion as he is now tipping his barrel all the way toward the catcher with a big sweeping movement: http://i.imgur.com/7afuWw3.gif http://i.imgur.com/rsYxTE5.gif That’s creating a rhythm to help time his movements with the pitcher. He's loose and oozing with confidence. In the screengrab from the Fangraphs article posted in the block quote above, the author notes that these are the two positions right before Dozier starts his swing in April and August. The conclusion is Dozier has brought his hands closer to his body and his bat upright right before he starts his swing. Depending on what you consider the start of his swing, it might not be wholly accurate. Backing out of the shot to where Dozier actually readies himself for the pitch, his hands and barrel are in a very similar position between the two dates. The newer model is slightly more upright than the previous version but in no way is it at the point that makes a significant difference to the overall swing. Certainly not to the extent that the screengrab would lead someone to believe. When he gathers himself into the pre-launch position, with the front foot making contact with the ground, his barrel and hands are back to the exact same spot. Dozier is doing something different prior to starting his swing that could be helping his timing which, in turn, may help him get to the pitch at the right moment. However, at all the critical portions of the swing, his hands and barrel are in the same spot. It is the second statement -- “This allows Dozier to get the barrel through the zone quicker, which goes a long way toward explaining the spike in hard contact, and his increased power on inside pitches” -- is a little off the mark. In regard to hitting the inside pitch, instead of focusing on the hand position in the screengrab, notice that Dozier is further off of the plate. In early May, Dozier explained to MLB.com's Rhett Bollinger the reason he moved away from the plate. "The way my swing works is that I have to create space," Dozier said. "I like to be able to get extended, but I felt trapped and that I had to cheat, which caused me to drop [my hands]. So it's night and day now. I feel good." Moreover, getting the barrel through the zone quicker has never been Dozier’s problem nor is it a reason why he's jacking so many bombs right now. As Tom Brunansky told me this spring, Dozier’s biggest problem was that his barrel was not in the zone long enough. He was too quick with his barrel in the zone, the exact opposite of what the author believes is happening. The major difference between the two style of swings is a bit more complicated and harder to see in video than what was present. Dozier has been getting behind the ball more -- meaning his barrel has stayed in the zone longer than it did at the beginning of the year. https://twitter.com/ParkerHageman/status/772893988034531328 As Dozier told the Star Tribune’s LaVelle Neal recently, his approach at the plate is now “trying to knock down the center field wall” which is a cue to stay behind the ball and not necessarily an attempt to drive the ball to the middle of the field. "Staying behind the ball doesn’t mean trying to hit the ball the other way or up the middle,” he told Fangraphs' Sarris back in June. “I can hit 100 balls to left field and as long as I stay behind the ball and really backspin it with the top hand in a good position, I’ll get what I want.” In a recent home run swing, you can see that in his barrel turn behind him -- which is working on getting behind the ball and staying in the zone: https://twitter.com/ParkerHageman/status/773380310369234944 This is the mechanical adjustment where the rubber meets the road for Brian Dozier. The pre-swing hand placement is mostly eyewash, a great timing mechanism that does add a small trigger difference but not an influential component of his power binge. The real question is, with 18 games remaining in 2016, does Dozier have it in him to break Harmon Killebrew's single-season record of 49?