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Baseball can be irrationally important to some people. In fact, if you’re reading this, there’s a good chance that you are a part of this group. When the Twins win, the sky seems a little bit bluer, and the grass a little greener. The 2006 season, however, has had its share of dreary days.
I don’t think we ask too much of the Twins organization. Most of the frustration with the season thus far hasn’t been due directly to the sub-.500, fourth place record. The real ire has been caused by how that record was compiled. It’s always easy to second-guess personnel decisions after they have failed. But over the winter and into spring, Twins fans decried front-office moves as they were made, only to see their worst fears realized. When Tony Batista returned from the Far East to man the hot corner, the anger followed almost immediately. When Juan Castro became the Opening Day shortstop, a near-revolt followed. Even the signing of Rondell White, while not blasted to the extent that some other decisions were, was viewed as just an adequate substitute for more high-reward options, like Jim Thome, Nomar Garciaparra, and Frank Thomas.
We all know what happened next. The pitching staff collapsed, and the trio of Batista, White, and Castro played horrendously (measured by VORP, White has been the worst player in baseball this season). The team free-fell to fourth, and the year looked lost. But the worst part was that the Twins appeared to be “staying the course” by playing older, aging players ahead of younger options. We were going to be in for a long summer.
Funny how things change, eh? Suddenly, with a few choice maneuvers and a set of home victories, the days ahead don’t appear as gloomy. A rash of common sense seems to have swept through the organization, and now it’s actually exciting to follow the Twins again. Even if this season is lost, the events of the last week, along with some substantial advantages in other areas, have given the future some much-needed hope.
Most obvious are the moves made of the left side of the infield. In a manner of days, the Opening Day shortstop and third baseman are not only off the field, but off the team. Tony Batista (and his .236/.303/.388 line) has been designated for assignment, and Juan Castro’s mind-blowing .231/.258/.303 is now property of the Reds and former Terry Ryan disciple Wayne Krivsky. Taking over the starting shortstop job, at long last, is Jason Bartlett. With still nearly one hundred games left, the remainder of the season will allow the Twins to finally decide if Bartlett is the long-term answer at shortstop.
Even the Punto/Tiffee/Rodriguez Triangle of Authority at third base doesn’t seem so bad. It shouldn’t be difficult for the trio to at least equal Batista’s putrid offensive efforts, and replacing a statue at the hot corner with real defensive players will surely help pitchers like Carlos Silva, who relies heavily on contact instead of striking out large numbers of batters.
This re-shuffling of the left side of the infield appears to be part of a larger youth movement, one that has long been called for throughout the Twins blogosphere. By adding Bartlett to the emerging core of Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Jason Kubel, and Michael Cuddyer, the beginnings of the Twins of 2007 and beyond are taking shape.
The exploits of Chairman Mauer hardly require elaboration in this space. His 33.0 VORP (through June 15) almost doubles the second-best catcher in baseball, Brian Mccann (19.5). He is eighth in all of baseball, ahead of players like Jason Giambi, Jim Thome, and Miguel Cabrera. And by the way, he’s hitting .378, if you haven’t heard.
Michael Cuddyer has staked claim to right field, it appears. I’m still in favor of giving him another run at third base (a much more difficult position to fill), but that’s just quibbling at this point. He’s been the Twins’ second best hitter this season, and while Kyle Lohse might disagree, has played a passable right field with a good arm.
Morneau and Kubel have been more recent developments. Morneau got off a truly horrid start out of Spring Training, but over the last month has begun to drive the ball to all fields, hit for power (15 home runs), and even get is OBP up into the .330 range. That’s still not good enough, but he appears to have finally found his groove at first.
Kubel is fresh off of a series spent beating Boston pitching like a pi?ata. His question has been health, and that question seems to have been answered. He is showing no ill effects from his massive knee injury, and has finally gotten comfortable at the plate again after missing all of last year. While the three-homer series will be few and far between, the system’s top hitting prospect has finally arrived.
Of course, the strength of the Twins the past five years has been the pitching. One morning, while “working” and listening to the P.A. and Dubay show on our local KFAN affiliate, co-host Jeff Dubay dropped this little piece of wisdom:
“Having pitching in baseball is like having cigarettes in prison.”
If Dubay’s analogy holds, the Twins might as well be Joe Camel. In all likelihood, three-fifths of the rotation that headed north to start the season in 2006 will be pitching elsewhere (or not at all) in 2007. Since, by all accounts, Scott Baker is still very much a part of the Twins’ future, the 2007 rotation is shaping up as a Santana/Liriano/Baker love-fest, with Boof Bonsor in the picture, along with another arm, Pitcher A.
Who this Pitcher A will end up being will likely be one of the biggest off-season debates surrounding this organization. It is possible that the Twins could go young with someone like 23-year-old Glen Perkins or 22-year-old Matt Garza, but Terry Ryan has shown reluctance to put too many young starters into the rotation, and with Lirano, Bonsor, and Baker already in place, a fourth youngster could be too much for the GM to bear. A more likely situation, it seems, is for the Twins to make a Kenny-Rogers-type signing with some open payroll space (more on that in a bit). A solid veteran at the end of the rotation could be a stabilizing presence for an overwhelmingly young staff.
The bullpen is shaping up to be a strength for this club going forward as well. A pen chosen from Joe Nathan, Juan Rincon, Matt Guerrier, Willie Eyre, Jesse Crain (who I wouldn’t mind seeing get some time back in Rochester to right the ship, but that’s a topic for another day), Dennys Reyes, Pat Neshek (1.96 ERA, 6/1 K/BB ratio in AAA), and J.D. Durbin (who is quietly having a turn-around season for Rochester) would work quite nicely.
This is to say nothing of the pitching in the pipeline. The aforementioned Matt Garza is on the fast-track through the organization, and fellow 2005 draft pick Kevin Slowey has done everything possible in Ft. Myers. The ability to develop young, major-league capable pitching is invaluable when you think of the price teams like the Cubs paid last winter for mediocre bullpen arms.
There is also plenty of payroll space to look forward to this winter. With a slew of expiring contracts totaling nearly $40 million of this season’s payroll (contract numbers provided by Cot’s Baseball Contracts), Terry Ryan could be looking at a bit of flexibility for the first time in years. Even after raises due to players like Santana and Nathan (due an extra $3 and $1.5 million, respectively, payroll space will be plentiful enough to pick up Louis Castillo’s option, re-sign Juan Rincon and Mike Redmond, and maybe even hang on to Torii Hunter (if he agrees to a new deal).
There’s the new stadium to consider, as well. The payroll has been slowly expanding for the last few years, and with a new yard on the horizon, Terry Ryan’s resources will only continue to grow.
Another win on Friday; Option K strikes out eleven, and the win streak is pushed to five. With everything that is happening with this club now, the dog days of summer might turn out to be more purebred than mutt.
Saturday, June 17, 2006
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Links of the Day for 6/16/06
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Juan Castro was traded for Brandon Roberts a speedy single A outfielder. Here’s some timely analysis from ubelmann. Bartlett is now entrenched at SS for the rest of the season, and let’s hope he can prove he sticks around. Batista and Castro are probably only the first few shoes to drop, look for White to go soon. I also doubt Terry Ryan is satisfied with the in-house options at third so look for something to happen in that regard.
The worse thing about Tony Batista being designated for assignment is we can no longer play this lovely game.
If you need a fix for quick information after the games, including a recap written by a beat writer and game notes, filled with juicy anecdotes and manager speak you should check out Kelly Thesier’s articles at Twins Official Site; she’s typically the fastest with her reports, coming within the hour, and sometimes before the game is over.
Mainstream Power Rankings: Espn.com has us at 23rd, Sportsline.com has us at 22nd, Foxsports.com has us at 23rd, and Sportsillustrated.com has at 23rd, for a total of 90 points, if they reach 100 points they get a free riding mower from…
Juan Castro was traded for Brandon Roberts a speedy single A outfielder. Here’s some timely analysis from ubelmann. Bartlett is now entrenched at SS for the rest of the season, and let’s hope he can prove he sticks around. Batista and Castro are probably only the first few shoes to drop, look for White to go soon. I also doubt Terry Ryan is satisfied with the in-house options at third so look for something to happen in that regard.
The worse thing about Tony Batista being designated for assignment is we can no longer play this lovely game.
If you need a fix for quick information after the games, including a recap written by a beat writer and game notes, filled with juicy anecdotes and manager speak you should check out Kelly Thesier’s articles at Twins Official Site; she’s typically the fastest with her reports, coming within the hour, and sometimes before the game is over.
Mainstream Power Rankings: Espn.com has us at 23rd, Sportsline.com has us at 22nd, Foxsports.com has us at 23rd, and Sportsillustrated.com has at 23rd, for a total of 90 points, if they reach 100 points they get a free riding mower from…
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Links of the Day for 6/14/06
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In a moment of clarity, the Twins have optioned Tony Batista to AAA Rochester and have called shortstop Jason Bartlett up. I'm surprised ar the lack of "I told you so's" coming from twins' bloggers. I half-way expected Aaron Gleeman and Seth Stohs to douse Gardy in Gatorade.
In the Strib article, Ron Gardenhire offered two explanations for the roster move
In a moment of clarity, the Twins have optioned Tony Batista to AAA Rochester and have called shortstop Jason Bartlett up. I'm surprised ar the lack of "I told you so's" coming from twins' bloggers. I half-way expected Aaron Gleeman and Seth Stohs to douse Gardy in Gatorade.
In the Strib article, Ron Gardenhire offered two explanations for the roster move
- Tony Batista is not hitting enough home runs (he's on a pace to hit 13).
- Jason Bartlett has learned how to be a leader in the infield, his last skill necessary to play in the major league.
That second reason makes me cringe. Apparently leadership is a skill that can only be learned in the minor leagues. It would be so much nicer if the final skill a major-league shortstop needed was something more tangible, like building a lightsaber.
Rondell White may be on the move as well, possibly as early as Friday when interleague begins in Pittsburgh. Which, by the way, is a series of no consequence according to FoxSports blogger Dayn Perry. Just try to say that to the six thousand fans at the game.
This is beginning to sound like a broken record, but why isn't Mauer in the top five for all star votes at Catcher?
Links of the Day for 6/14/06
By Intern Jimmy
Grand Finale: Wowzers! The inning struck 12 and Jason Kubel’s bat went on record to say “Keep Me, I’m Good” to cap a nailbiter of a game in walk-off grand salami fashion. The marquee matchup with the BoSox featured a clash of titan pitchers in Curt Shilling and Johan Santana. The pitcher’s duel didn’t disappoint, combining to sprinkle 11 hits over 16 workhorse innings and striking out 18 between them. The 1-1 knot remained until Boston tacked one on in the top of the 12th. Things looked bleak when Mauer inconceivably struck out looking. All that changed after Kubel officially indoctrinated himself into Twins lore.
Epic victories like this convince you that anything is possible in the 2nd half. Sure the glass has looked half empty for a while, but 12.5 games back with 100 to play isn’t loony, especially when the wild card could easily come out of the Central. With the youth movement maturing rapidly before our eyes, there’s no telling what these kids are capable of. Mauer hit for .400? Why not. Liriano challenge Santana for the Cy en route to the ROY? Likely. Morneau hit 30 bingers this season? It’s bound to happen to some unsuspecting Twin. Kubel gain more confidence on a daily basis? Happening, with impressive results. Cuddyer belt grand slams bi-weekly? Check back next week.
Fast Start: Francisco Liriano is a marvel to behold. It’s not often filthy phenoms like this bust onto the scene, let alone fall into your team’s lap in an obscenely one-sided 3 for 1 deal. And it’s a marvel of modern sports that two like-talented (and like-handed) pitchers share a clubhouse. So just how similar has the Franchise’s jump out of the gate been to his mentor? I’ll let the numbers do the talking. Quite stunning, actually.
Is it me or do Twins fans have collective amnesia regarding Santana’s first few turns on the mound? Is Liriano’s ceiling greater than the Sears Tower? It’s downright frightening how untouchable he is this early in the process and he’s still learning. I feel sorry for the American League in the years to come.
*Thanks to the splendid people at baseball almanac.com for a top notch site, who made finding Santana’s early box scores much easier than I anticipated.
Required Reading: Not just because this article heaps praise upon Mr. Twin, Chairman Mauer, but because it’s Gammons and Gammons is the truth when it comes to the diamond. When you catch the eye of PG to merit a title shout out, you’re special. And if you’re not an ESPN Insider, you need to reevaluate your priorities.
Grand Finale: Wowzers! The inning struck 12 and Jason Kubel’s bat went on record to say “Keep Me, I’m Good” to cap a nailbiter of a game in walk-off grand salami fashion. The marquee matchup with the BoSox featured a clash of titan pitchers in Curt Shilling and Johan Santana. The pitcher’s duel didn’t disappoint, combining to sprinkle 11 hits over 16 workhorse innings and striking out 18 between them. The 1-1 knot remained until Boston tacked one on in the top of the 12th. Things looked bleak when Mauer inconceivably struck out looking. All that changed after Kubel officially indoctrinated himself into Twins lore.
Epic victories like this convince you that anything is possible in the 2nd half. Sure the glass has looked half empty for a while, but 12.5 games back with 100 to play isn’t loony, especially when the wild card could easily come out of the Central. With the youth movement maturing rapidly before our eyes, there’s no telling what these kids are capable of. Mauer hit for .400? Why not. Liriano challenge Santana for the Cy en route to the ROY? Likely. Morneau hit
Fast Start: Francisco Liriano is a marvel to behold. It’s not often filthy phenoms like this bust onto the scene, let alone fall into your team’s lap in an obscenely one-sided 3 for 1 deal. And it’s a marvel of modern sports that two like-talented (and like-handed) pitchers share a clubhouse. So just how similar has the Franchise’s jump out of the gate been to his mentor? I’ll let the numbers do the talking. Quite stunning, actually.
Santana’s 1st 9 Starts (Age 21-22):
| Date | IP | Hits | ER | BB | K |
| | 5 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| | 3.2 | 10 | 7 | 1 | 2 |
| | 3.1 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 3 |
| | 5.1 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| | 4.2 | 7 | 7 | 3 | 4 |
| | 4 | 6 | 5 | 2 | 4 |
| | 5.1 | 6 | 4 | 1 | 5 |
| | 5 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| | 5.1 | 8 | 4 | 1 | 1 |
| Totals | 41.2 | 57 | 39 | 18 | 25 |
Liriano’s 1st 9 Starts(Age 21-22)
| Date | IP | Hits | ER | BB | K |
| | 5 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 6 |
| | 3.2 | 6 | 6 | 3 | 6 |
| | 6 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 8 |
| | 7 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 8 |
| | 5 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 5 |
| | 5 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 6 |
| | 6 | 1 | 0 | 4 | 4 |
| | 6 | 7 | 3 | 2 | 3 |
| | 7 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 6 |
| Totals | 50.2 | 33 | 18 | 19 | 52 |
Is it me or do Twins fans have collective amnesia regarding Santana’s first few turns on the mound? Is Liriano’s ceiling greater than the Sears Tower? It’s downright frightening how untouchable he is this early in the process and he’s still learning. I feel sorry for the American League in the years to come.
*Thanks to the splendid people at baseball almanac.com for a top notch site, who made finding Santana’s early box scores much easier than I anticipated.
Required Reading: Not just because this article heaps praise upon Mr. Twin, Chairman Mauer, but because it’s Gammons and Gammons is the truth when it comes to the diamond. When you catch the eye of PG to merit a title shout out, you’re special. And if you’re not an ESPN Insider, you need to reevaluate your priorities.
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
Dugout Splinters: What's Working
by Twins Geek
The following is from Dugout Splinters, included in GameDay.
Um, youth, for the most part. As if that’s fair.
The Twins top three starting position players in OPS (On-base Plus Slugging percentage) are Joe Mauer (986 OPS, .386 BA, 23 years old), Michael Cuddyer (901 OPS, .272 BA, 27 years old) and Justin Morneau (815 OPS, 47 RBI, 25 years old). On the verge of joining them is 24-year-old Jason Kubel, who has hit .351 with an 878 OPS in the month of June. I ask you, is that fair? It’s enough to make us old timers throw our tapioca in disgust.
That has prompted formerly curmudgeonly scribes from the fourth estate to suggest that it’s time for a youth movement, to “play the kids”. Great idea, but exactly which kids aren’t playing yet? For the most part, they’re already here, with the notable exception of Jason Bartlett, who’s .306 batting average, 23 doubles, and superior defensive range continue to support the Red Wings atop the International League’s North Division. (Psst, Gardy, some might say that’s a sign of leadership.)
Beyond Bartlett, it’s a little harder to justify playing time for players who have never risen above mediocre, even in the minors, like Terry Tiffee (who is 27 years old), Nick Punto (29 years old) or Lew Ford (also 29 years old). Upon Shannon Stewart’s return they could move Cuddyer to third base to allow Kubel to continue to play everyday in the outfield, but is that really necessary when the designated hitter spot is available?
The following is from Dugout Splinters, included in GameDay.
What’s Working?
Um, youth, for the most part. As if that’s fair.
The Twins top three starting position players in OPS (On-base Plus Slugging percentage) are Joe Mauer (986 OPS, .386 BA, 23 years old), Michael Cuddyer (901 OPS, .272 BA, 27 years old) and Justin Morneau (815 OPS, 47 RBI, 25 years old). On the verge of joining them is 24-year-old Jason Kubel, who has hit .351 with an 878 OPS in the month of June. I ask you, is that fair? It’s enough to make us old timers throw our tapioca in disgust.
That has prompted formerly curmudgeonly scribes from the fourth estate to suggest that it’s time for a youth movement, to “play the kids”. Great idea, but exactly which kids aren’t playing yet? For the most part, they’re already here, with the notable exception of Jason Bartlett, who’s .306 batting average, 23 doubles, and superior defensive range continue to support the Red Wings atop the International League’s North Division. (Psst, Gardy, some might say that’s a sign of leadership.)
Beyond Bartlett, it’s a little harder to justify playing time for players who have never risen above mediocre, even in the minors, like Terry Tiffee (who is 27 years old), Nick Punto (29 years old) or Lew Ford (also 29 years old). Upon Shannon Stewart’s return they could move Cuddyer to third base to allow Kubel to continue to play everyday in the outfield, but is that really necessary when the designated hitter spot is available?
The unexpected benefit of this season is that numerous injuries and collapses by veterans have allowed nearly every one of the Twins' major-league-ready players to solidly claim their stake on the future. That’s great news for Twins fans who are starting to look forward to 2007, or to a new stadium in 2010. On the other hand, it’s not realistic to think there are more answers in the minors that may bring immediate success. The reality is that most of this farm system has already been harvested.
Monday, June 12, 2006
“Hey, you never know.”
by Twins Geek
In 2004, Sam Walker, the sports columnist for the Wall Street Journal, was invited to join one of the premier fantasy baseball leagues in America. He decided to use his access to players, GMs and scouts to try and win the league, and wrote about the year in the book Fantasyland. Among other stories, he talks in amusing detail about his efforts to influence “his team”, including trying to alter Jacque Jones’ approach at the plate or get Doug Mientkiewicz traded to the Pirates.
His team’s year was at a critical point when he received a trade offer for his player David Ortiz where he would receive Alfonso Soriano. Unsure, he asked Ortiz his opinion.
Ortiz starts to laugh. He thinks this is funny. “Depenze on wha you need,” he says.
“Well, I’m OK with home runs, but I need some stolen bases.”
“Well, den, dare you go.”
“So you think it’s a good deal?”
“Thadda be great.”
”So I should do it…”
Ortiz smiles mischeviously.
“Thass up to you.”
“You’re not planning on stealing a bunch of bases all of a sudden, are you?”
“Hey, you never know.”
Walker makes the trade and, of course, Ortiz goes on “murderous baseball-mashing rampage.” After a game in which Ortiz nearly hits for the cycle, Walker marches up to him in a fit of moral outrage.
The moment [Ortiz] sees the anguished look on my face, he begins to laugh even harder, his giant shoulders heaving like hydraulic pumps.
“Dude, you shodana leezen to me, becoze I’m abow to get hot. Theens are abow to get UGLY.”
“But Papi, you’ve gotta cool off sometime…”
Ortiz has stopped smiling. He puffs up his chest, plants a finger between his pectorals, and booms out one final piece of advice.
“YOO BETTA GET ME BACK!”
Twins fans know how Sam Walker feels. For a franchise that has long searched for a legitimate power threat in the middle of the lineup, and for an offense that is struggling to score runs (especially in the clutch) this is more than just painful. It's easy to criticize the Twins for letting Ortiz slip away, but I find that most of the time, that criticism comes from people with short memories. Because in 2002, Twins fans didn't have a big problem with releasing Ortiz.
It’s easy to forget exactly how disappointing Ortiz had been in his three years with the Twins. He had raced through the minors and was nabbed in a trade for Dave Hollins, but hadn't shown any real signs of improvement from 1999 through 2002 despite having 1100 major league at-bats. He constantly fought injuries. People openly doubted his age, with him even addressing it publicly in newspaper interviews. And in 2002, he quit hitting left-handers, hitting just .203 with a 637 OPS (On-base Plus Slugging percentage). He had turned into an unhealthy Jacque Jones, only without the glove.
Though Ortiz was the designated hitter, the most legitimate criticism is that the Twins had essentially chosen Doug Mientkiewicz over Ortiz. After all, Ortiz could have played first base. Both could hit left-handed. Ortiz looked like the better hitter, while Mientkiewicz looked like the better fielder.
But this also ignores some history. Up to that point, Mientkiewicz had been pretty healthy, while Ortiz had never had more than 415 at-bats in any of his three years. Also, Mientkiewicz was going to cost the Twins about a million dollars less than Ortiz.
For the most part, the rest of the major leagues also disregarded Ortiz. The Twins couldn't trade him for a bucket of warm spit at the General Manager's meetings that year, as the market was flush with corner infielders. He didn't sign with another team until a month after the Twins released him. His salary for 2003 was $250,000 less than the Twins had paid him the year before Even with the Red Sox, he was slated for the least playing time of the sluggers they had brought in, behind legends like Kevin Millar and Jeremy Giambi.
We also forget that the Twins were trying to find some at-bats for some young players. Matt LeCroy is often mentioned, but the Twins were also trying to find room for some young studs named Bobby Kielty and Michael Cuddyer. All three of those names generated legitimate excitement for Twins fans in 2002. LeCroy and Cuddyer had been pasting the ball in AAA, and Kielty was hitting at least as well as Ortiz.
At the time, it made sense, because Ortiz was just Ortiz, not Big Papi. The decision to release him was the kind of decision that a small market team, committed to developing young talent, needs to make all the time. Sometimes, those moves work out.
And sometimes, theens get UGLY.
In 2004, Sam Walker, the sports columnist for the Wall Street Journal, was invited to join one of the premier fantasy baseball leagues in America. He decided to use his access to players, GMs and scouts to try and win the league, and wrote about the year in the book Fantasyland. Among other stories, he talks in amusing detail about his efforts to influence “his team”, including trying to alter Jacque Jones’ approach at the plate or get Doug Mientkiewicz traded to the Pirates.
His team’s year was at a critical point when he received a trade offer for his player David Ortiz where he would receive Alfonso Soriano. Unsure, he asked Ortiz his opinion.
Ortiz starts to laugh. He thinks this is funny. “Depenze on wha you need,” he says.
“Well, I’m OK with home runs, but I need some stolen bases.”
“Well, den, dare you go.”
“So you think it’s a good deal?”
“Thadda be great.”
”So I should do it…”
Ortiz smiles mischeviously.
“Thass up to you.”
“You’re not planning on stealing a bunch of bases all of a sudden, are you?”
“Hey, you never know.”
Walker makes the trade and, of course, Ortiz goes on “murderous baseball-mashing rampage.” After a game in which Ortiz nearly hits for the cycle, Walker marches up to him in a fit of moral outrage.
The moment [Ortiz] sees the anguished look on my face, he begins to laugh even harder, his giant shoulders heaving like hydraulic pumps.
“Dude, you shodana leezen to me, becoze I’m abow to get hot. Theens are abow to get UGLY.”
“But Papi, you’ve gotta cool off sometime…”
Ortiz has stopped smiling. He puffs up his chest, plants a finger between his pectorals, and booms out one final piece of advice.
“YOO BETTA GET ME BACK!”
Twins fans know how Sam Walker feels. For a franchise that has long searched for a legitimate power threat in the middle of the lineup, and for an offense that is struggling to score runs (especially in the clutch) this is more than just painful. It's easy to criticize the Twins for letting Ortiz slip away, but I find that most of the time, that criticism comes from people with short memories. Because in 2002, Twins fans didn't have a big problem with releasing Ortiz.
It’s easy to forget exactly how disappointing Ortiz had been in his three years with the Twins. He had raced through the minors and was nabbed in a trade for Dave Hollins, but hadn't shown any real signs of improvement from 1999 through 2002 despite having 1100 major league at-bats. He constantly fought injuries. People openly doubted his age, with him even addressing it publicly in newspaper interviews. And in 2002, he quit hitting left-handers, hitting just .203 with a 637 OPS (On-base Plus Slugging percentage). He had turned into an unhealthy Jacque Jones, only without the glove.
Though Ortiz was the designated hitter, the most legitimate criticism is that the Twins had essentially chosen Doug Mientkiewicz over Ortiz. After all, Ortiz could have played first base. Both could hit left-handed. Ortiz looked like the better hitter, while Mientkiewicz looked like the better fielder.
But this also ignores some history. Up to that point, Mientkiewicz had been pretty healthy, while Ortiz had never had more than 415 at-bats in any of his three years. Also, Mientkiewicz was going to cost the Twins about a million dollars less than Ortiz.
For the most part, the rest of the major leagues also disregarded Ortiz. The Twins couldn't trade him for a bucket of warm spit at the General Manager's meetings that year, as the market was flush with corner infielders. He didn't sign with another team until a month after the Twins released him. His salary for 2003 was $250,000 less than the Twins had paid him the year before Even with the Red Sox, he was slated for the least playing time of the sluggers they had brought in, behind legends like Kevin Millar and Jeremy Giambi.
We also forget that the Twins were trying to find some at-bats for some young players. Matt LeCroy is often mentioned, but the Twins were also trying to find room for some young studs named Bobby Kielty and Michael Cuddyer. All three of those names generated legitimate excitement for Twins fans in 2002. LeCroy and Cuddyer had been pasting the ball in AAA, and Kielty was hitting at least as well as Ortiz.
At the time, it made sense, because Ortiz was just Ortiz, not Big Papi. The decision to release him was the kind of decision that a small market team, committed to developing young talent, needs to make all the time. Sometimes, those moves work out.
And sometimes, theens get UGLY.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Who Woulda Thunk It?
Powered by Intern Sam
There’s been a lot of talk on this blog and others in the last few weeks about the status of Ron Gardenhire, and whether the Twins’ struggles have him on the hot seat with Terry Ryan. Opinions seem to range widely, all the way from “he’s been useless from the beginning, and the Twins won those three straight division titles in spite of him, not because of him” to “leave the poor guy alone, Terry Ryan screwed him with his offseason moves, and besides, there’s nothing wrong with managing by instinct.”
There are even a few people prowling the discussion boards (and TwinsGeek’s comments section) insisting that, while a few gentle second-guesses might be all right, Twins fans are shaming themselves when they become noticeably frustrated over the judgment of the manager of Our Only Base Ball Team. (This seems like an odd line of reasoning to Intern Sam, mainly because the sports blogosphere is not exactly known for employing a “We’ve Got Spirit, Yes We Do!” style of fan engagement, so it would seem odd for anyone who prefers simply to root, root, root and ignore the gaffes to even be reading the blogs in the first place. But to each his own…)
The fact is, though, it can be awfully hard to judge the performance of a manager from an outsider’s perspective, since most of the moves he makes in a given season aren’t quantifiable in any useful way. To sit down and separate out just how much of the blame for the Twins’ disappointing first half should be laid at Gardenhire’s feet is an impossible task given the statistical tools currently available to us. After all, Gardenhire doesn’t select the players on his team (as has become blindingly obvious in the last week or so,) so can he be held even partially responsible for the struggles of Rondell White, Tony Batista, and Brad Radke? Possibly, but we don’t know for sure.
What infuriates many Twins fans is really Gardenhire’s apparent unwillingness to see the game the way we, the fans, see the game, and to react accordingly. That’s not to say that he’s right and we’re wrong (or vice versa,) just an attempt to put the whole situation in some kind of perspective. (All that having been said, Intern Sam still comes down most frequently on the side of those who say that the Twins could do better than Ron Gardenhire, but he isn’t foaming at the mouth about it.)
Still and all, the Twins remain a club divided against itself, not in the sense of team chemistry, but in the sense that there are now clearly two sets of 2006 Twins: the good ones and the bad ones. We all know who belongs in what set, and it’s up to Terry Ryan to decide, for instance, how much longer Rondell White will be allowed to continue wasting a spot on the roster. But when a season goes south as soon as this one did, with a core of players as talented as the Twins have, there is always a temptation to chalk the whole thing up to bad luck and bad timing. After all, no one dreamed that White, always a steady near-.300 hitter, would have the meltdown of his career the minute he stepped inside the Dome, right? And Carlos Silva? Who would have imagined, after last season, that Silva would be the first guy yanked from the rotation?
Well, as it happens, there are a number of prominent statgeeks who have waded into the nasty business of player performance projection in the last few years, and this weekend, as Intern Sam relaxed in the Upper Club at the Dome, secure in the knowledge that at least Francisco Liriano is bulletproof, he began wondering how much of the current Twin misery was actually foretold by the so-called experts. To answer the question, we’ll turn to arguably the two most well-respected sabermetric publications in the biz: Baseball Prospectus, and The Bill James Handbook, both published annually. The authors of these tomes are not exactly colleagues (and anecdotal evidence suggests that they don’t always play well together,) but that should only help us, in that we’ll be looking at two independently reached conclusions.
Here’s how we’ll do it: below, I’ve listed the six regular players and starting pitchers who constitute the core of the Bad Twins team, along with their 2006 stats through June 11. Listed alongside are the 2006 projections for each player from the 2006 editions of both the Bill James and BP annuals. (One exception: since both annuals were sent to press before anyone knew Tony Batista would be playing in Minnesota in 2006, I’ve used the predictions from the 2005 annuals. This isn’t ideal, of course, but nothing Batista did in Japan in 2005 would have had much of an impact on his numbers, as best I can tell.)
Most of the stats are self-explanatory, but I’ll clarify two less common ones upfront. Bill James uses a stat known as “Runs Created” (RC), which purports to quantify how many of the runs a team scores over the course of a season are attributable directly to that player. I won’t go into the math here, but this is a fairly well respected (if limited) statistic, and it was from the RC stat that James eventually crafted his far more complex (and controversial) Win Shares metric.
On the Baseball Prospectus lines, Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) is included as well. This is a wildly complex stat involving ballpark effects, positional variances, and the effect of the tides on Cristian Guzman’s hair, but all you need to know to get the gist is that VORP is an attempt to measure, by runs per season, how much better or worse a player is than a fictional player whose skills exactly match those of an average replacement player available to an average major league team at minimal cost. Players above zero are better than that average, those below zero are below that average. (There are people who hate this stat, partly because it implies that an average major league ballplayer is worth nothing, but I feel that this is a largely semantic argument in an arena where semantics are meaningless, so I’m using it.)
Why go through all this silliness just to tell us what we already know – namely, that a lot of Twins are underachieving this season? Quite simply, as summer swings into full gear, Intern Sam would like to know once and for all whether anyone (or everyone) should have seen the train wreck coming a mile down the tracks. Let’s have at it…
Rondell White
2006 Stats: .190/.209/.224; 0 HR; 4 BB; 29 K
James: .284/.337/.461; 19 HR; 33 BB; 79 K; 75 RC
BP: .292/.338/.463; 13 HR; 23 BB; 57 K; VORP=15.7
Okay. It’s obvious that no one thought White would be the out-making disaster that he has been. Neither projection system thought he would be as strong as he was in 2005 (when he hit .313 and with an OPS of .836) but to say that Terry Ryan should have known this pick-up wouldn’t work out is unfair. The plan was for White to stay healthy by staying out of the field, and for him to hit something like the average of his career stats, which is what both James and BP projected him to do in ‘06.
It’s worth noting that the BP annual did have White listed as a 40% chance to collapse in 2006 (in BP-speak, a collapse is a 20% or more slump in overall production,) but that’s a marginal measurement at best, and given the Twins’ needs measured against their limited budget, we can’t really blame anyone but the baseball gods for what’s happened to Rondell.
Tony Batista
2006 Stats: .236/.303/.388; 5 HR; 15 BB; 27 K
James (2005 ed.): .245/.284/.451; 30 HR; 32 BB; 90 K; 75 RC
BP: .253/.301/.428; 18 HR; 31 BB; 76 K; VORP=4.5
This is a bit tougher to figure. Both projections are in the ballpark as far as batting average and on-base percentage go, but neither forecasted the power drop. Of course, as I mentioned, these numbers are intended for the 2005 season, which Batista spent in Japan. I wish we had fresher numbers to choose from, since I suspect both models would have docked Batista considerably for having not seen major league caliber pitching in 18 months.
It’s worth noting that while Bill James sees White and Batista as equals as far as creating runs, BP’s VORP ranks Batista as barely better than its imaginary replacement player. Subtract the homers, and he’s surely well below average. So should we have seen this coming? Well. We did, didn’t we? This was the most controversial move Terry Ryan made in the offseason, and in this case, it appears that the fans were right, and the GM goofed.
Juan Castro
2006 Stats: .234/.261/.312; 1 HR; 6 BB; 22 K
James: .241/.277/.355; 7 HR; 19 BB; 64 K; 38 RC
BP: .255/.287/.379; 4 HR; 9 BB; 32 K; VORP=1.0
The experts had it nailed here. Castro is basically your textbook replacement player, and nothing in his career prior to 2006 suggested that he would be even remotely useful as an everyday shortstop. It’s worth noting that both annuals made their predictions assuming that Castro wouldn’t be an everyday shortstop in 2006, because of course, the Twins had…
Jason Bartlett
2006 Stats (AAA): .306/.328/.445; 1 HR; 8 BB; 26 K
James: .273/.343/.386; 7 HR; 47 BB; 67 K; 61 RC
BP: .271/.340/.394; 7 HR; 38 BB; 61 K; VORP=17.3
Now, on the surface, this may not look like a huge deal, numbers-wise. After all, even if the Bartlett predictions were dead on the money, it’s not like the Twins decided to replace Derek Jeter with Cristian Guzman when they kept Castro and demoted Bartlett to Rochester. But the truth of the matter is that Bartlett is 26, and the Twins need to find out if he can be their everyday shortstop of the future before he either gets frustrated and quits, or gets so old that he loses all trade value. Furthermore, there’s just no quantifiable reason for anyone on the Twins to have actually thought that Castro would put up better numbers.
Defense, you say? Baseball Prospectus’s rankings, which take both range and accuracy into account, say that Bartlett is three times the defensive shortstop Castro is. (The fact that he made a few errors last year is countered by his clearly superior range in the field. The laser-like focus on occasional errors to the exclusion of all else is the same kind of backwards attitude that causes Dick and Bert to spend hours extolling the ability of Tony Batista to consistently make good plays on “balls hit to him,” ignoring the obvious fact that he has a total range of about four feet to either side and is therefore a defensive liability.)
The bottom line here is that someone (Gardenhire?) clearly has a problem with Jason Bartlett that has nothing to do with his game, and no one is saying what it is. We’ll probably never know, but just for the sake of history, let’s not forget that the last time a Twins manager ran a middle infielder out of the organization because he just didn’t like the cut of his jib, we got five years of Luis Rivas while Todd Walker batted .291 and thumbed his nose from afar. And if that’s not enough to convince you that Castro over Bartlett is an error of serious proportions, consider this: in Baseball Prospectus’s list of player comparables, Bartlett is listed as being somewhat comparable to Jerry Hairston. Castro is Billy Ripken.
Brad Radke
2006 Stats: 4-7, 6.17 ERA; 22 BB; 38 K
James: 10-10, 3.87 ERA; 28 BB; 108 K
BP: 11-10, 4.17 ERA; 28 BB; 104 K
Look, we all love Bradke. He’s been a workhorse for as long as most of us can remember, and Lord knows, he was good when practically no one else on this team was. But listening to Twins fans talk about Radke in the offseason always makes me feel like I’m back in college in the late 1990s, listening to Cleveland Indians fans explain to me how their team was finally going to get over the hump this season while conveniently ignoring the fact that their starting staff was still anchored by Charles Nagy.
Now, no, the Indians didn’t have Johan Santana, and yes, Radke had a great year in 2004 (despite his 11-8 record,) but the numbers said fairly clearly that Radke wasn’t going to be anything special this year, and even now that he appears to have turned his season around somewhat, he’ll probably finish not too far off from what’s predicted above. And that’s the best-case scenario. Am I saying the Twins should have dumped Radke, or found a trade in the offseason? No. I’m saying that it wasn’t hard to foresee that he is no longer a legitimate #2 starter, and certainly not a useful top-flight starter for a club hoping to contend.
Carlos Silva
2006 Stats: 2-8, 7.73 ERA; 10 BB; 22 K
James: 9-10, 4.11 ERA; 27 BB; 70 K
BP: 10-11, 4.47 ERA; 28 BB; 70 K
Kyle Lohse
2006 Stats (ML only): 2-4, 9.22 ERA; 22 BB; 27 K
James: 8-13, 4.78 ERA; 47 BB; 109 K
BP: 9-10, 4.67 ERA; 42 BB; 87 K
The Baseball Prospectus crew says this far better than I ever could:
“[The Twins haven’t] really adjusted to the fact that their rotation isn’t good enough. While the Sox are making a point of improving their rotation… the Twins are playing make-believe, and continuing to crowd the rotation with the same good-enough guys who are no longer good enough. They’re hoping Brad Radke can be the pitcher he was in 2004 [and] wishcasting that Kyle Lohse might build on his 2003, instead of recognizing that was a good year from a fourth starter… And in doing so, they’ve crowded out their pitchers with real up-side, making only a single rotation slot open to Francisco Liriano, Scott Baker, J.D. Durbin, and perhaps Boof Bonser.”
That’s kind of the 2006 season in a nutshell, isn’t it? The fact that it was written sometime in January just makes it all the more depressing. Because if the question is whether anyone in the Twins’ brain trust should have known that what they had wasn’t going to be good enough to compete in this year’s Central Division, the answer, clearly, is yes. That doesn’t mean there would have been any easy answers regardless, but at least by acknowledging that the chance of contention with this team was slim to none, the front office would have freed itself to spend the year finding out who the real major league players in the system are, and preparing to contend in 2007.
Instead, they’ve clung to mediocre veterans like Castro and allowed White and Batista to continue to flail away despite knowing for a fact that none of those players will figure in the Twins’ long-term future. Meanwhile, Bartlett rots in Rochester and guys like Kubel and Baker get jerked around just when they should be getting a chance to adjust to the majors.
I know this is a buzzkill of a column, and I apologize. The Twins took two out of three from Baltimore this weekend, Joe Mauer has apparently become the God Of On-Base Percentage, Liriano and Santana continue to dazzle, and there are plenty of reasons to keep going out to the Dome this season. This isn’t a Kansas City situation- the Twins have some unbelievable talent on the major league level, and a full-scale rebuilding shouldn’t be necessary to get the club back to playoff caliber. But the current strategy of signing (and keeping) other teams’ cast-offs in the hope that they’ll be magically transformed into the Boston Red Sox isn’t working anymore. And the numbers say that someone should have known better.
There’s been a lot of talk on this blog and others in the last few weeks about the status of Ron Gardenhire, and whether the Twins’ struggles have him on the hot seat with Terry Ryan. Opinions seem to range widely, all the way from “he’s been useless from the beginning, and the Twins won those three straight division titles in spite of him, not because of him” to “leave the poor guy alone, Terry Ryan screwed him with his offseason moves, and besides, there’s nothing wrong with managing by instinct.”
There are even a few people prowling the discussion boards (and TwinsGeek’s comments section) insisting that, while a few gentle second-guesses might be all right, Twins fans are shaming themselves when they become noticeably frustrated over the judgment of the manager of Our Only Base Ball Team. (This seems like an odd line of reasoning to Intern Sam, mainly because the sports blogosphere is not exactly known for employing a “We’ve Got Spirit, Yes We Do!” style of fan engagement, so it would seem odd for anyone who prefers simply to root, root, root and ignore the gaffes to even be reading the blogs in the first place. But to each his own…)
The fact is, though, it can be awfully hard to judge the performance of a manager from an outsider’s perspective, since most of the moves he makes in a given season aren’t quantifiable in any useful way. To sit down and separate out just how much of the blame for the Twins’ disappointing first half should be laid at Gardenhire’s feet is an impossible task given the statistical tools currently available to us. After all, Gardenhire doesn’t select the players on his team (as has become blindingly obvious in the last week or so,) so can he be held even partially responsible for the struggles of Rondell White, Tony Batista, and Brad Radke? Possibly, but we don’t know for sure.
What infuriates many Twins fans is really Gardenhire’s apparent unwillingness to see the game the way we, the fans, see the game, and to react accordingly. That’s not to say that he’s right and we’re wrong (or vice versa,) just an attempt to put the whole situation in some kind of perspective. (All that having been said, Intern Sam still comes down most frequently on the side of those who say that the Twins could do better than Ron Gardenhire, but he isn’t foaming at the mouth about it.)
Still and all, the Twins remain a club divided against itself, not in the sense of team chemistry, but in the sense that there are now clearly two sets of 2006 Twins: the good ones and the bad ones. We all know who belongs in what set, and it’s up to Terry Ryan to decide, for instance, how much longer Rondell White will be allowed to continue wasting a spot on the roster. But when a season goes south as soon as this one did, with a core of players as talented as the Twins have, there is always a temptation to chalk the whole thing up to bad luck and bad timing. After all, no one dreamed that White, always a steady near-.300 hitter, would have the meltdown of his career the minute he stepped inside the Dome, right? And Carlos Silva? Who would have imagined, after last season, that Silva would be the first guy yanked from the rotation?
Well, as it happens, there are a number of prominent statgeeks who have waded into the nasty business of player performance projection in the last few years, and this weekend, as Intern Sam relaxed in the Upper Club at the Dome, secure in the knowledge that at least Francisco Liriano is bulletproof, he began wondering how much of the current Twin misery was actually foretold by the so-called experts. To answer the question, we’ll turn to arguably the two most well-respected sabermetric publications in the biz: Baseball Prospectus, and The Bill James Handbook, both published annually. The authors of these tomes are not exactly colleagues (and anecdotal evidence suggests that they don’t always play well together,) but that should only help us, in that we’ll be looking at two independently reached conclusions.
Here’s how we’ll do it: below, I’ve listed the six regular players and starting pitchers who constitute the core of the Bad Twins team, along with their 2006 stats through June 11. Listed alongside are the 2006 projections for each player from the 2006 editions of both the Bill James and BP annuals. (One exception: since both annuals were sent to press before anyone knew Tony Batista would be playing in Minnesota in 2006, I’ve used the predictions from the 2005 annuals. This isn’t ideal, of course, but nothing Batista did in Japan in 2005 would have had much of an impact on his numbers, as best I can tell.)
Most of the stats are self-explanatory, but I’ll clarify two less common ones upfront. Bill James uses a stat known as “Runs Created” (RC), which purports to quantify how many of the runs a team scores over the course of a season are attributable directly to that player. I won’t go into the math here, but this is a fairly well respected (if limited) statistic, and it was from the RC stat that James eventually crafted his far more complex (and controversial) Win Shares metric.
On the Baseball Prospectus lines, Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) is included as well. This is a wildly complex stat involving ballpark effects, positional variances, and the effect of the tides on Cristian Guzman’s hair, but all you need to know to get the gist is that VORP is an attempt to measure, by runs per season, how much better or worse a player is than a fictional player whose skills exactly match those of an average replacement player available to an average major league team at minimal cost. Players above zero are better than that average, those below zero are below that average. (There are people who hate this stat, partly because it implies that an average major league ballplayer is worth nothing, but I feel that this is a largely semantic argument in an arena where semantics are meaningless, so I’m using it.)
Why go through all this silliness just to tell us what we already know – namely, that a lot of Twins are underachieving this season? Quite simply, as summer swings into full gear, Intern Sam would like to know once and for all whether anyone (or everyone) should have seen the train wreck coming a mile down the tracks. Let’s have at it…
Rondell White
2006 Stats: .190/.209/.224; 0 HR; 4 BB; 29 K
James: .284/.337/.461; 19 HR; 33 BB; 79 K; 75 RC
BP: .292/.338/.463; 13 HR; 23 BB; 57 K; VORP=15.7
Okay. It’s obvious that no one thought White would be the out-making disaster that he has been. Neither projection system thought he would be as strong as he was in 2005 (when he hit .313 and with an OPS of .836) but to say that Terry Ryan should have known this pick-up wouldn’t work out is unfair. The plan was for White to stay healthy by staying out of the field, and for him to hit something like the average of his career stats, which is what both James and BP projected him to do in ‘06.
It’s worth noting that the BP annual did have White listed as a 40% chance to collapse in 2006 (in BP-speak, a collapse is a 20% or more slump in overall production,) but that’s a marginal measurement at best, and given the Twins’ needs measured against their limited budget, we can’t really blame anyone but the baseball gods for what’s happened to Rondell.
Tony Batista
2006 Stats: .236/.303/.388; 5 HR; 15 BB; 27 K
James (2005 ed.): .245/.284/.451; 30 HR; 32 BB; 90 K; 75 RC
BP: .253/.301/.428; 18 HR; 31 BB; 76 K; VORP=4.5
This is a bit tougher to figure. Both projections are in the ballpark as far as batting average and on-base percentage go, but neither forecasted the power drop. Of course, as I mentioned, these numbers are intended for the 2005 season, which Batista spent in Japan. I wish we had fresher numbers to choose from, since I suspect both models would have docked Batista considerably for having not seen major league caliber pitching in 18 months.
It’s worth noting that while Bill James sees White and Batista as equals as far as creating runs, BP’s VORP ranks Batista as barely better than its imaginary replacement player. Subtract the homers, and he’s surely well below average. So should we have seen this coming? Well. We did, didn’t we? This was the most controversial move Terry Ryan made in the offseason, and in this case, it appears that the fans were right, and the GM goofed.
Juan Castro
2006 Stats: .234/.261/.312; 1 HR; 6 BB; 22 K
James: .241/.277/.355; 7 HR; 19 BB; 64 K; 38 RC
BP: .255/.287/.379; 4 HR; 9 BB; 32 K; VORP=1.0
The experts had it nailed here. Castro is basically your textbook replacement player, and nothing in his career prior to 2006 suggested that he would be even remotely useful as an everyday shortstop. It’s worth noting that both annuals made their predictions assuming that Castro wouldn’t be an everyday shortstop in 2006, because of course, the Twins had…
Jason Bartlett
2006 Stats (AAA): .306/.328/.445; 1 HR; 8 BB; 26 K
James: .273/.343/.386; 7 HR; 47 BB; 67 K; 61 RC
BP: .271/.340/.394; 7 HR; 38 BB; 61 K; VORP=17.3
Now, on the surface, this may not look like a huge deal, numbers-wise. After all, even if the Bartlett predictions were dead on the money, it’s not like the Twins decided to replace Derek Jeter with Cristian Guzman when they kept Castro and demoted Bartlett to Rochester. But the truth of the matter is that Bartlett is 26, and the Twins need to find out if he can be their everyday shortstop of the future before he either gets frustrated and quits, or gets so old that he loses all trade value. Furthermore, there’s just no quantifiable reason for anyone on the Twins to have actually thought that Castro would put up better numbers.
Defense, you say? Baseball Prospectus’s rankings, which take both range and accuracy into account, say that Bartlett is three times the defensive shortstop Castro is. (The fact that he made a few errors last year is countered by his clearly superior range in the field. The laser-like focus on occasional errors to the exclusion of all else is the same kind of backwards attitude that causes Dick and Bert to spend hours extolling the ability of Tony Batista to consistently make good plays on “balls hit to him,” ignoring the obvious fact that he has a total range of about four feet to either side and is therefore a defensive liability.)
The bottom line here is that someone (Gardenhire?) clearly has a problem with Jason Bartlett that has nothing to do with his game, and no one is saying what it is. We’ll probably never know, but just for the sake of history, let’s not forget that the last time a Twins manager ran a middle infielder out of the organization because he just didn’t like the cut of his jib, we got five years of Luis Rivas while Todd Walker batted .291 and thumbed his nose from afar. And if that’s not enough to convince you that Castro over Bartlett is an error of serious proportions, consider this: in Baseball Prospectus’s list of player comparables, Bartlett is listed as being somewhat comparable to Jerry Hairston. Castro is Billy Ripken.
Brad Radke
2006 Stats: 4-7, 6.17 ERA; 22 BB; 38 K
James: 10-10, 3.87 ERA; 28 BB; 108 K
BP: 11-10, 4.17 ERA; 28 BB; 104 K
Look, we all love Bradke. He’s been a workhorse for as long as most of us can remember, and Lord knows, he was good when practically no one else on this team was. But listening to Twins fans talk about Radke in the offseason always makes me feel like I’m back in college in the late 1990s, listening to Cleveland Indians fans explain to me how their team was finally going to get over the hump this season while conveniently ignoring the fact that their starting staff was still anchored by Charles Nagy.
Now, no, the Indians didn’t have Johan Santana, and yes, Radke had a great year in 2004 (despite his 11-8 record,) but the numbers said fairly clearly that Radke wasn’t going to be anything special this year, and even now that he appears to have turned his season around somewhat, he’ll probably finish not too far off from what’s predicted above. And that’s the best-case scenario. Am I saying the Twins should have dumped Radke, or found a trade in the offseason? No. I’m saying that it wasn’t hard to foresee that he is no longer a legitimate #2 starter, and certainly not a useful top-flight starter for a club hoping to contend.
Carlos Silva
2006 Stats: 2-8, 7.73 ERA; 10 BB; 22 K
James: 9-10, 4.11 ERA; 27 BB; 70 K
BP: 10-11, 4.47 ERA; 28 BB; 70 K
Kyle Lohse
2006 Stats (ML only): 2-4, 9.22 ERA; 22 BB; 27 K
James: 8-13, 4.78 ERA; 47 BB; 109 K
BP: 9-10, 4.67 ERA; 42 BB; 87 K
The Baseball Prospectus crew says this far better than I ever could:
“[The Twins haven’t] really adjusted to the fact that their rotation isn’t good enough. While the Sox are making a point of improving their rotation… the Twins are playing make-believe, and continuing to crowd the rotation with the same good-enough guys who are no longer good enough. They’re hoping Brad Radke can be the pitcher he was in 2004 [and] wishcasting that Kyle Lohse might build on his 2003, instead of recognizing that was a good year from a fourth starter… And in doing so, they’ve crowded out their pitchers with real up-side, making only a single rotation slot open to Francisco Liriano, Scott Baker, J.D. Durbin, and perhaps Boof Bonser.”
That’s kind of the 2006 season in a nutshell, isn’t it? The fact that it was written sometime in January just makes it all the more depressing. Because if the question is whether anyone in the Twins’ brain trust should have known that what they had wasn’t going to be good enough to compete in this year’s Central Division, the answer, clearly, is yes. That doesn’t mean there would have been any easy answers regardless, but at least by acknowledging that the chance of contention with this team was slim to none, the front office would have freed itself to spend the year finding out who the real major league players in the system are, and preparing to contend in 2007.
Instead, they’ve clung to mediocre veterans like Castro and allowed White and Batista to continue to flail away despite knowing for a fact that none of those players will figure in the Twins’ long-term future. Meanwhile, Bartlett rots in Rochester and guys like Kubel and Baker get jerked around just when they should be getting a chance to adjust to the majors.
I know this is a buzzkill of a column, and I apologize. The Twins took two out of three from Baltimore this weekend, Joe Mauer has apparently become the God Of On-Base Percentage, Liriano and Santana continue to dazzle, and there are plenty of reasons to keep going out to the Dome this season. This isn’t a Kansas City situation- the Twins have some unbelievable talent on the major league level, and a full-scale rebuilding shouldn’t be necessary to get the club back to playoff caliber. But the current strategy of signing (and keeping) other teams’ cast-offs in the hope that they’ll be magically transformed into the Boston Red Sox isn’t working anymore. And the numbers say that someone should have known better.
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