25 Jan. 2009: Coming off a solid season in which he did not see much playing time in the second half, Orlando Hudson remained unsigned despite several teams needing help at second base, where he has established himself as a frontline player.
25 Jan. 2010: Second verse, same as the first.
Hudson’s extended availability after the 2008 season made a fair amount of sense. His extended absence in the second half was due to a dislocated wrist that required surgery, ending his season in early August. Even missing almost two months, Hudson was still a type-A free agent, and was offered arbitration by Arizona, giving teams another reason to be wary.
Indeed, Hudson wouldn’t sign with the Dodgers until 20 February, the day many pitchers and catchers reported.
This time around, Hudson’s availability is a little bit of a mystery. He was dinged up at the end of the season, but losing his playing time to Ronnie Belliard was based on something besides health and performance. Sure, Belliard was hot at the end of the year, but Hudson was a top-3 second baseman in 2009 and yet found himself riding pine.
The Dodgers didn’t handcuff Hudson the way the Diamondbacks did after the 2008 season, they didn’t offer him arbitration, making him a much more attractive target to thrifty teams that are opposed to giving up first-round picks.
At 5.4 wins above replacement player, Hudson was the 33rd most valuable player in baseball last year, equal to Joe Nathan, and more valuable than CC Sabathia, Shin-Soo Choo, Justin Verlander, or Aaron Hill. While he is more than respectable at the plate (9th highest VORP among second baseman with an above average EqA), Hudson’s value derives greatly from his skill afield.
Normally, my go-to defensive stat is Ultimate Zone Rating or UZR, and Hudson’s -3.3 runs below average in 2009 isn’t terrible, but I think it undervalues his skill. Clay Davenport’s Fielding Runs Above Average ranks him as 16 runs above average at second base*, which seems about right. He’s a plus defender, who doesn’t leave the bat at home. His injured groin almost certainly limited his lateral movement later in the season, which may have helped to depress his UZR, but something that isn’t likely to hang on into 2010.
*Necessary note: despite both being called “runs” the scale for UZR and FRAA is very different, so it isn’t that there’s a nearly 20 run discrepancy between the two, just that one ranks him as above average and the other slightly below. It looks like a big difference, but it’s a little bit of an optical illusion.
A career .282/.348/.431 hitter, Hudson is a prototypical top of the order hitter. He draws walks at an above average rate, makes good contact, and while he isn’t a power hitter by any definition, he’s not Jason Tyner or Adam Everett.
Which brings us to the Twins’ needs, namely, a slick-fielding second baseman and a high-OBP hitter to hit ahead of Mauer/Morneau/Kubel/Cuddyer. If you haven’t connected these dots yet, well, I can’t much help you.
If you believe that those really are the Twins’ needs (which, to a large extent, they are), then you’ve got to see Hudson as the answer. He’s a switch hitter, meaning he won’t contribute to the lefty block at the top of the order, and he’s a perfect hitter behind Span and ahead of Mauer.
The sticking point here, as it so often is, is cash monies (as the kids say). Lest ye tread the well-trodden path of “BLARG the Twins are too cheap to sign anyone!” it seems pertinent to look at the Twins’ finances at this point in the offseason. According to Joe C’s estimates at the Star Tribune, the Twins have sunk some $90 million into the payroll this year, which would raise them from 23rd to 14th in the payroll rankings (assuming no other team had spent money this offseason, the exact rankings won’t be known for weeks). Irrespective of rank, the Twins payroll is $23 million higher than last year, and that’s before Mauer’s new contract is announced.
Hudson’s contract requests are said to be at 1-year, $9 million, which would make him the fifth highest-paid Twin if he were to get it. Now, with most free agents, this time of year is when you see their prices drop (Mark DeRosa this year, Joe Crede last year, it’s a grand tradition), but O-Hud seems locked into his $9 million demands.
The Nationals, the other team mentioned in connection with O-Dawg, seem to have turned their eyes elsewhere after finding Hudson to be more or less intransigent. In an email, Baseball Prospectus’ John Perotto noted that Hudson was really unhappy with the way last offseason went, the way he was treated by Joe Torre, and as such, was determined to get paid like he thought he deserved to be paid.
Money is value, Hudson wants to be valued, so pay the man his money. I get that. It does make me wonder if he’d accept a multiyear deal for a lower average annual value. The Twins don’t have anyone waiting in the wings at second or short, so if they believe Hudson can be productive into his age 33-34 seasons, there’s little reason not to save the money on the front end and sign him to a 3/21 deal instead of the 1/9 he’s reported to be seeking. Granted, it puts the Twins on the hook for more money in an absolute sense, and Hudson hasn’t been the healthiest of players, but it’s an option worth exploring if the Twins are willing to commit $6-7 million to a player, but not the full $9 million Hudson is seeking.
The fact is that the Twins won’t pay $9 million for Hudson. That doesn’t mean that he won’t get $9 million from someone, or that the Twins won’t be the team that ends up signing him for less, but right now there’s just no common ground. If I had to guess, I believe that Hudson’s price will drop eventually, perhaps even soon. Everyone wants to be paid what they believe themselves to be worth, but when push comes to shove, a job is a job.
The two teams most commonly connected to Hudson thus far are the Twins and the Nats, both of whom seem to be waiting for Hudson’s price to fall. I can’t see either deciding at this point that they are just going to sign him—damn the cost—when they’ve waited this long to make a move.
As in the past, this is a question of dollars and cents. The Twins have already upgraded the infield, and may choose to target their dwindling fund elsewhere, but they’ve already shown a willingness to spend $5 million (the amount they offered Jarrod Washburn). If they can spend $2 million more, and if Hudson is willing to drop his price by that same amount, I really think that a deal will get done. What remains to be seen is if either of those things will happen.
Just a couple quick notes from the action of the last few days.
First, I do apologize for the lack of content on my part. The Twins haven’t been particularly active and I have been. Grad School is…a mental investment I may or may not have been ready to make. It knocks you on your can pretty good if you aren’t ready for it, but just like any good fighter, the important thing is getting back up. But yeah, the entire class got a cumulative score of 0 on the first assignment; welcome to my last two weeks.
I did recently write a piece for Baseball Prospectus which I am proud of. Getting to put my name in the author logs with Christina Kahrl, Will Carroll, Kevin Goldstein, Joe Sheehan, Keith Law, Nate Silver, and the rest of BP’s incredible alumni was a goal I’ve had for a long time, and well worth the wait. It was a piece of free content so please go check it out!
Second, and perhaps more importantly, there was news regarding a third baseman today, which means it affected the Twins, if only peripherally.
Kevin Kouzmanoff, profiled here earlier, was traded to the A’s along with a prospect for Scott Hairston and Aaron Cunningham. I love this deal for the A’s, since neither of these two were going to be part of any long term plan, and Kouzmanoff is a pretty decent addition. The fact that Hairston was traded from the Padres to the A’s last season makes this deal kind of strange, but all-in-all, I like it fine for both sides.
Needless to say, this kicked up a fair amount of consternation among the Twins’ faithful on Twitter, and presumably also in real life. I can understand that. Kouz is better than anyone the Twins are likely to trot out at third at this point, and neither Hairston nor Cunningham represents a huge investment on the A’s part.
That said, they overpaid, which means the Twins would have had to do the same.
Hairston was a productive regular last season, worth 2.3 wins (2.6 coming while he was in San Diego, -0.3 while he was in Oakland) and while Cunningham is looking more and more like a AAAA player, he’s just going into his age 24 season, meaning he could turn a corner and become productive in his own right.
The Twins had offered Glen Perkins alone and the Padres had turned them down, asking for more than just the left-hander, and now we can see why. Perkins wasn’t great last year, he was injured, and he became a headache to the team by filing a grievance over service time issues. Even if you decide that he and Hairston are about equal, which they aren’t, the Twins don’t really have a Cunningham ready to go. That second player would have ended up being someone like Rene Tosoni or someone of that nature—a high teens, low 20s prospect reasonably close to the majors.
I get that fans want to see the team add someone at third, but the outcry over a Perkins/Tosoni-for-Kouzmanoff deal would have been much louder than it is with Kouz now off the table, and rightly so. As I said back in December, “the Padres want Perkins AND, with the name following the ‘and’ unknown as of yet. Who the second player ends up being will strongly influence how this perspective deal is interpreted.” Now that we know generally who that second player would be, I can say with confidence that I am glad the Twins’ brass passed on this deal. So don’t be fooled by any handwringing you see, this is ultimately a good thing for the Twins.
On the second base side of things, there are still good options to pursue. Orlando Hudson wants Adrian Beltre money (1 year, $9 million), but the only team who has been connected to him at that mark is the Nationals. The Nats are quietly not going to be awful next year, but I still can’t see them adding Hudson at that price, not with Christian Guzman still there and Ian Desmond ready to claim the SS position.
John Perotto, a man of many very good sources, said in a chat on baseballprospectus.com that he believes the Twins are in on Hudson, but are waiting for his price to drop. Save your complaints on the Twins’ tightwad ways, there’s no way Hudson is worth the same amount as Beltre, making this a situation like Joe Crede last season: a desire to do something is no excuse for doing something dumb, like overpaying for talent.
The Twins waited on Crede and got their man without getting locked into some insane Boras-induced contract. If the Nats want to fork over $9 million, more power to them, but I doubt they will and once Hudson’s expectations drop, expect the Twins to be there.
Recall that the Twins offered Jarrod Washburn $5 million not long ago, so the money is there to be spent. I firmly believe that if Hudson wants to come to Minneapolis, he will. The money won’t kill a deal unless the Twins get grossly outbid by the Nats or some other mystery team.
Hudson said he wanted to sign with a team soon, according to the Nationals’ website, but didn’t give a clue to who or when. Still, I don’t think he’ll let himself be teamless when camps open like he was last year, meaning he’ll probably sign within the next two weeks.
Felipe Lopez remains available as well, so the Twins certainly have a few options out there yet even if Hudson doesn’t work out.
Among the things that struck me with the arrival of 2010 last night (hmm…I start grad school in four days…) was a new found excitement for the opening of Target Field. As a lifelong Twins fan, I spent many a night twisted half around in my seat to face home plate instead of somewhere between second base and the centerfielder, phenomenal seats for the Vikings game the next day, but not so great for a pitchers’ duel.
In my excitement, I went looking for some press on the new stadium, and there’s a lot of excitement around baseball about this new park. Buster Olney wrote a very nice piece a few days ago about how great they new place would be, but for some reason, he’s in the minority. If you believe the buzz, Target Field will see one baseball game, it will be 100 degrees below zero and Bud Selig will close the place until a roof is built after Albert Pujols gets eaten by a roving polar bear.
Seriously?
Minnesota is cold, that is a fact this time of year. As I write this—6 pm on January 1, 2010—it is three degrees above 0 with a wind chill of -14. That sure sounds cold, doesn’t it? Only, according to the Army Handbook, that doesn’t even constitute a dangerous level of cold; it would take well over two hours for frostbite to set in on completely exposed skin. Does it get down to those dangerous levels? Absolutely it does! The coldest temperature I can personally remember was a day with a -70 windchill ( February 2, 1996. The same day Tower, MN set the state record at -60 degrees Fahrenheit—no windchill included). I was skiing, and my handwarmers froze. It was very cold—blindingly cold, in fact—but last I checked, the places they play baseball on February 2 are places like Caracas, Venezuela and San Pedro de Macoris, Dominican Republic—pretty much not Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Without question, there will be some chilly nights, and maybe a snowout or two like the Indians had last year, but it’s hardly an abnormal risk in major league baseball. Cold isn’t the only risk for spring baseball; precipitation is as big a risk as any chilly temp. Cold can be overcome with layers (a concept with which Minnesota residents are well acquainted), but precipitation is going to cause a game to be postponed, no matter what’s falling from the sky—rain, snow, sleet, hail, locust—it just doesn’t matter.
Here is a list of major league cities in which the stadium lacks a roof along with their average April temperatures and average number of rainy days in that month:
City
Avg. April Temp.
Avg. Rainy Days
Minneapolis
46
10
Boston
49
11
Chicago
49
13
Cleveland
49
14
Denver
48
9
Detroit
48
13
Pittsburgh
50
14
Milwaukee
45*
12
*the retractable roof is supposed to be closed if gametime temp is below 60.
Minneapolis may be the coldest of the bunch, but not by much, and it has the second fewest days of precipitation of any of the cities under five degrees away from it in temperature. I’d much rather watch a game in 44 and clear than 48 and drizzle, but your millage may vary.
Hard numbers aside for a moment, I feel uniquely positioned to speak to this issue. I spent the first 18 Aprils of my life in the Twin Cities and the last four in Chicago, and I can unequivocally say that Chicago’s wind and damp cold makes it feel much colder than an April day in MSP. Watching the Cubs play the Marlins in mid-April with the win blowing in off the lake was a truly bone-chilling experience.
I’m not trying to somehow convince you that due to the urban heat shield effect that Target Field will actually be warm; it’s going to be cold and, at times, really cold. I’m simply sick of seeing and hearing that it will be some abnormally frigid stadium. On any given night, it’s likely to be as cold if not colder in nearly 1/3rd of MLB stadiums, and certainly drier.
According to reports by FoxSports.com’s John Paul Morosi, the Twins are still looking for a middle infielder, which is hardly surprising considering just one member of Game 163’s infield (Michael Cuddyer, Nick Punto, Orlando Cabrera, and Matt Tolbert) is likely to be in the starting infield next season. Sure, their projected 2010 infield (Justin Morneau, Alexi Casilla, J.J. Hardy, and Punto) is better in some places, but it’s weaker in others and not much better overall as a result.
What was surprising about Morosi’s report is that the Twins are also in the market for a fifth starter. I, like many writers, felt like the signing of Carl Pavano would more or less take the Twins out of the running for another arm. After all, the Twins have the top four set and a number of arms waiting to take the fifth spot.
It seems unlikely that Glen Perkins will return to the rotation after his well chronicled falling out with the team over his penchant for hiding injuries, then pitching terribly, and blaming the previously undisclosed injury for his abhorrent performance. If he’s even with the organization when camps break in a little over 90 days, I’ll be surprised.
Brian Duensing pitched extremely well down the stretch, far better than anyone thought he would. In his eight starts from August 22 to the end of the season, he went 5-1 with a 2.64 ERA and a WHIP of 1.3 in 47.2 innings. He struck out 31 and induced a ton of groundballs, which help him pitch around the batters he did allow to reach.
Anthony Swarzak was a reasonably well thought-of prospect, and he showed that promise on occasion, but his 2009 was by and large a disappointing effort. His fastball, change, and curveball all ranked as below average pitches, with his curve nearly five runs below average. He could slot in as a fifth starter if the Twins needed him to, and for many teams he’d fill that role decently, but he’s no better than the third best option for the fifth slot.
Jeff Manship made five starts at the end of the season, none bigger than his first—a five inning, one-run effort against the White Sox on September 1. While he may make a few appearances in spring training, it’s unlikely that he’ll break camp with the team.
Four arms loosely breaking down into two decent options and two prospects not yet ready. If these were the Twins’ options, a veteran arm might not be a bad idea (though as noted earlier, Jarrod Washburn is not an option worth pursuing). But there’s another player in this mix, one that has caused fans and prognosticators alike more headaches in the last two seasons than nearly any other player in baseball. The Twins other fifth starter option is none other than Capt. E. Nigma himself: Francisco Liriano.
Starting back in 2006 does more harm than good at this point. Liriano will never be that pitcher again. The question is if he can even be the pitcher who was nearly a win above replacement in 2008 despite throwing just 76 big-league innings.
His return from Tommy John surgery in 2008 was a study in patience as he began the year poorly, improved after being sent down to AAA, then went 6-1 with a 2.74 ERA and a 1.18 WHIP over 65.2 innings. His nearly 3-1 K/BB ratio was augmented by a low HR rate and a good GB/FB ratio. There’s good reason why the 2009 Baseball Prospectus Annual listed him as likely to be the ace of the staff in the coming season.
His 2009 was a regression par excellence; disappointing to say the least. He gave up three runs or more as many times in April alone as he did in his final 11 starts of 2008. Cold weather struggles are nothing new for Liriano, so hope that he’d bounce back was far from misplaced, and as May began, it looked like he might be waking up from a winter’s nap that had simply lasted too long. It didn’t take, however, as continued to struggle to string two good starts together. But that’s the key: from the press he received, you’d think Liriano was consistently bad, when in fact his problem was consistency. He had a number of very good starts—some amongst the best the Twins got all season, but he also gave them two of their ten worst starts (for what it’s worth, Glen Perkins was responsible for both the worst and second-worst start the Twins received all year, as well as another in the bottom 10).
It’s not hard to see what happened to Liriano that caused him to falter so badly: his fastball, which has never been his best pitch, fell from 3.6 runs below average to a shockingly bad 25.6 runs below average despite rising in velocity from an average of 90.9 MPH in 2008 to 91.7 in 2009. Not only did the pitch get worse, he threw it more often, making an already bad situation even worse.
Still, even with the limits on his slider placed in order to keep his arm healthy, Liriano has some of the best stuff of any of the potential starters on the staff. His slider is still an above average offering, especially since he’s eliminated the “bad slider” that he was using to set up his good one. His change, too, is a solid offering, giving him two plus secondary pitches essentially without a foundation. If he can get his fastball back to even the level it was at in 2008 (bad, but closer to average), his two secondary offerings will play that much better, and he should resume his previous effectiveness.
This all brings us to his most recent outings. In his first four starts for Escogido in the Dominican Winter League leave him with a line of 16.2 IP, 11 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 20 K, a 1.08 ERA, a 0.84 WHIP, and especially encouraging are the 20/3 K/BB ratio and the 12.4 K/9. A grain of salt would be good when reading these numbers, as the DWL includes players at every level of the minors, as well as the majors. He’s induced 18 swinging strikeouts to just two looking, and while hard PFX data isn’t readily available, it seems fair to assume that his fastball isn’t getting hammered and that his slider has plenty of bite.
Counting on Liriano to be the ace of the staff is foolish, but they don’t need an ace—Scott Baker will be much better next year after an already decent 2009. Counting on him to be an innings-eater is foolish, but they don’t need an innings-eater—Carl Pavano, Nick Blackburn, and Baker all threw 200 innings. What they are looking for is a fifth starter in the truest sense of the term, someone who can take the ball every fifth day and give the team a chance to win. Liriano can be so much more than that if he reestablishes his foundation such that the Twins don’t have to worry about him giving them a two-inning stinker.
The Twins would be foolish to give up on Liriano at this point, he’s just 26 and has electric stuff when it’s on. Worst case scenario, he struggles again and the Twins go to Duensing or Swarzak; all that’s lost is time and maybe a game or two early in the season. The more likely scenario is that Liriano finds some comfort with his changeup, reestablishes his fastball, and continues to utilize a top-flight slider to post a much better 2010 than his 2009. He’ll never regain 2006’s majesty, but even a return to 2008’s performance will make the Twins a much better team than adding a Jarrod Washburn, Doug Davis, or most any other free agent arm within the Twins’ price range.
Even though Chone Figgins, Placido Polanco, and Pedro Feliz have been signed to play third base, the market is far from depleted. Free Agents like from Adrian Beltre to Troy Glaus are still teamless, which would be more surprising but for last year’s Type-A debacle where players like Orlando Hudson and Juan Cruz remained on the market long after the winter meetings.
This year, John Lackey is probably the biggest name to be signed so far, but Matt Holliday and Jason Bay remain in the aether, and even a top trade target like Dan Uggla can be had for the right price. Teams are simply willing to wait longer and see how the market develops rather than risk paying last year’s prices for an early shot at players (call it Raul Ibanez Syndrome).
The Twins are pioneers for this way of thinking, frequently signing players late in the offseason, with Joe Crede being the perfect example. Rather than bid against themselves, the Twins waited until Scott Boras could no longer pretend there was competing interest in his client, and the Twins were able to sign the player they wanted to a contract that was fair for both parties.
What should be somewhat surprising is that with a wide number of players available, some to sign and some to be acquired via trade, is that the Twins are already looking at option L on their offseason plan.
It isn’t too hard to see how the Twins got here: Adrian Beltre is likely to be too expensive, Mark DeRosa’s contract demands (3-years, 27 Million) are out of control given his age, the Marlins’ demands for Dan Uggla are ridiculous, so on and so forth ad infinitum. At the end of the day, we are where we are: Kevin Kouzmanoff.
There’s a lot of ground to cover with Kouz. His career OPS+ of 103 tells a lot about him, especially since it’s composed of a little over three years: one above average (110), a smattering below average (77 in 61 PAs with Cleveland), and two years of dead-on avereage (100). That’s a fair assessment of Kouzmanoff’s offensive contributions, a career .261/.308/.435 hitter isn’t bad at all—he shouldn’t be your team’s best player, but if he’s your worst, you’ve got a solid team.
And this is where the waters begin to murky. Proponents of Kouzmanoff will gleefully point out that he has accumulated that line—solid but unspectacular—in a park so pitcher friendly it’s the architectural equivalent of a home plate umpire with a five foot wide strike zone. And it’s true, Kouzmanoff’s career home/road split is non-trivial: .236/.287/.388 with 25 HR at Pecto compared to .284/.328/.477 with 37 HR elsewhere. 2009 saw the gulf widen to .220/.280/.382 and .287/.323/.455. This is all to say that Kouz looks like a much better hitter, indeed a good one, when he was anywhere but San Diego. And if there’s one thing I’m sure of in this crazy world, it’s that Minneapolis is not San Deigo.
So the Twins would be getting the road warrior who just needs a real ballpark to play in to become a star, right? Not quite. Using Baseball Reference’s Neutralized Batting tool, we can see exactly how Kouz would have looked in the Dome over his career and last season in particular. His career line bumps up to .271/.319/.449, while his 2009 goes to .261/.308/.426; it’s not a perfect system, but that’s a pretty good reference point, and it draws into perfect relief my complaint with Kouzmanoff: he never walks. Ever.
You may think this is hyperbole, but look at is this way: Kouzmanoff strikes out nearly four times more than he walks (K/BB of 4.03) whereas the average major league strikes out just twice for every walk drawn (K/BB of 2.02). His strikeout numbers are just about average, so the discrepancy comes from an incredibly low walk total. He jogged to first in just 4.7% of his PAs, again, well below the league average of 8.9%.
Consider for a moment Delmon Young, whose inability to let four consecutive bad pitches pass him by is legendary, posted a 2009 line of .284/.308/.425, disarmingly similar to Kouz’s projected line. Sure, Kouz would have walked a little more, but in the end a .308 OBP is what it is. Only 14 players who qualified for the batting title posted an OBP lower than .308; it is a very bad on-base percentage.
Bringing in Kouzmanoff isn’t exactly like adding another Young to the lineup, Kouz’s defense is above average, so he brings that to the table. His UZR over the last two seasons, 2.7 and 7.5, has been just fine, and indications are that he’s even improving at the position. He’s better in every way offensively than Joe Crede was, but doesn’t quite play defense at that level. He was worth 2.5 wins last season to Crede’s 1, so he’s an upgrade, but given that Crede missed 71 games, that’s not a difficult feat to accomplish.
But despite all these reasons, this rumor passes the smell test—in no way do I see this being farfetched or impossible. Why? Kouzmanoff is cheap in all the right ways. He’s a value-add, a guy who, as I noted above, is an asset to the team, but he’s only in his first year of arbitration, meaning he’d be with the team for at least three years at below market value. Since he is such an average player, his arb award wouldn’t be too much to handle either. Better still, the Padres are willing to accept Glen Perkins as part of a package for Kouz, meaning one less headache/arb case for the team to worry about.
Had that been the deal, Perkins for Kouz, I’d be all over it. That’s a nothing for something swap, it doesn’t matter if the something is your ideal piece, it was free. However, the Padres want Perkins AND, with the name following the ‘and’ unknown as of yet. Who the second player ends up being will strongly influence how this perspective deal is interpreted.
Let’s, for a moment, say that J.J. Hardy regains a reasonably high OBP, perhaps slightly better than his career .323 line, in the .340 range he was in, in 2008. The Twins then need a player to break up the lefties in their lineup, play good defense, and hit 6/7 in the order. Kouzmanoff makes perfect sense in this scenario as he does all of these things at a reasonable price.
However, since it’s unlikely that Hardy will hit that career high mark in the year in which he hops to the more difficult league, Kouzmanoff simply doesn’t fit the way the Twins top target should. If, at the end of the day, the market is laid bare, then perhaps he’ll make more sense as a secondary option or if the Pads agree to a deal involving Perkins and little else. However, as the market is currently well stocked with better options—prices yet unknown—and the Fathers don’t look desperate enough to move Kouz for such a low price. We can revisit this idea in a month or so if need be, but for the time being, the Twins should be looking elsewhere.
There had been some speculation ranging from sensible to outlandish about who the Twins would and would not tender contracts to. Jesse Crain’s large potential salary made him a real possibility, but there was never a chance of Delmon Young getting non-tendered, sorry haters.
One thing that is sure now that the Twins have tendered contracts to everyone who lacked one, is that the Twins’ bullpen is, barring injuries in camp, pretty much set. It looks quite like it did at the end of last season with one major change: Ron Mahay has departed, destination unknown, and will be replaced by Pat Neshek.
The number listed after ERA is the player’s WXRL or Wins Expected above Replacement Level. Using the expected runs matrix to determine how many runs an average pitcher would allow in any given situation, it measures how many runs a specific reliever prevented and how he changed the win probability. This particular iteration of the stat not only evaluates a pitcher against replacement level, but also weights the quality of hitters he faced. The best pitcher in the league this year was Mo Rivera with a 6.1 WXRL, and anything below 0 is considered to be worse than any of the freely available talent (average ML free agent or AAA pitcher).
Players are listed loosely in descending order of WXRL, with Crain’s second half improvement and Brian Duensing’s conversion to the rotation duly noted.
Joe Nathan (RHP, 47 Saves, 2.10 ERA, 5.158 WXRL)
The closer extraordinaire returns for another season with the Twins. He was 2-2 with a 2.10 ERA and a WHIP of .93 while converting 47 of 52 save opportunities. His 47 saves were a career high, though he threw just 68.2 innings. Look for a similar amount of innings, especially if Jesse Crain seems capable in close 8th inning spots (more on this later).
After a slipup against the Yankees in Game Two of the ALCS, Nathan was the subject of trade shouts, the vast majority of which were insane. You can make a case for dropping that salary, but the lack of a suitable replacement makes removing the Twins’ most consistent reliever a really poor idea. Nathan has been as good as any reliever in baseball over the last few seasons, posting a top 10 WXRL every year since 2006, a claim made by no other closer—not even Mo Rivera. He’s never been the best, but he’s still pretty special.
Matt Guerrier (RHP, 5-1, 2.36 ERA, 3.478 WXRL)
Guerrier’s nose dive from August 1, 2008 to the end of the season was one of the things that hurt the Twins most as their quest for the playoffs came up just short. He posted an ERA of 10.06 and a WHIP of 2.28 in 19.2 innings, simply horrid numbers that shook a lot of the confidence fans had in him.
2009 could not have been more different for Matty G, as he became the Twins’ 8th inning man of choice for most of the season. He dropped his ERA nearly three runs from 5.19 to 2.36 and his WHIP, 0.96, was below 1 for the first time in his career. Even though he once again lead the league in appearances with 79, he didn’t completely fall apart the way he had in 2008. He was as reliable a bridge to Joe Nathan as the Twins could have possibly wanted, so much so that for much of the season, games felt seven innings long—if Guerrier and Nathan got a lead, they probably held it.
There is a chance that Guerrier will retain his 8th inning duties, but as noted previously, my sense is that the Twins would like to have Crain in that role, if for no other reason than Guerrier can pitch effectively for more than one inning, whereas Crain tends to struggle if extended much past his first inning of work.
Jose Mijares (LHP, 2-2, 2.34 ERA, 3.425 WXRL)
Thought to be a lock to make the team out of Spring Training, Mijares’ lackluster effort found him back in AAA to open the year, but his time-out in Rochester was short lived—he made his season debut on April 22. Mijares clearly showed the effects of his highest innings total since 2007 as he faded badly in September and October. The best thing he did in autumn was get Delmon Young hit in the back, which more or less caused him to fugue. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that up until fatigue set in, Mijares was among the best left-handed specialists in baseball. He held fellow Flanderses to a .155/.228/.252 line, while right-handers hit him much harder: .283/.358/.433 to be exact. A really good LOOGY is never a bad thing to have on your roster, but if that’s all the more Mijares becomes, it will be a little bit of a disappointment. He’ll be the Twins’ primary weapon against tough lefties, but don’t be surprised if Gardy elects to use him as a mop-up man against righties to see if he can begin to get them out more effectively than he did last year. That goal will, of course, need to be balanced against the desire for Mijares to be more effective in the late season than he was last year, but that’s what a manager is for.
Jon Rauch (RHP, 5-1, 1.72 ERA, 0.574 WXRL)
The first Twin with a neck tattoo was acquired from Arizona in exchange for Kevin Mulvey, making him an honorary member of the Johan Santana trade. In 17 appearances with the Twins, Rauch posted a 1.72 ERA and a 1.21 WHIP—better than he had done with Arizona, but that should hardly surprise anyone considering how hitter-friendly Bank Whatever Park is. Rauch isn’t a great pitcher, but he took over for a downright terrible one, so he looked better by comparison. As a short relief option, Rauch will be an upgrade over the last season’s mistakes, but since the Twins already have a LOOGY, he’ll have to improve his efforts as far as getting sternsiders out in order to be really valuable.
Jesse Crain (RHP, 7-4, 4.70 ERA, -0.598 WXRL)
I don’t think I’ve ever been so sure of anything in my entire life than I was that Jesse Crain would lose the Twins’ June 14th game against the Cubs in Wrigley Field. Two singles, a walk, and a single to right later, I was right. To that point, Crain had appeared in 23 games, posting an 8.15 ERA and a WHIP of 1.9. Opposing hitters had a .306/.400/.500 line against him—put another way, he turned every hitter he faced into someone a little bit better than Chase Utley. Jesse Crain was epically bad.
In that way, the fiasco against the Cubs was one of the best things that happened to the Twins. Sure, a game was lost, but Crain’s meltdown was enough to get him demoted.
When he came back on July 23rd, Crain was back to his old self. In 34 regular season innings, Crain posted a 2.91 ERA and a 1.20 WHIP, while holding hitters to a .217/.324/.292 line. That’s indicative of a few too many walks, but when opponents aren’t hitting much more than singles off of you, you can afford to walk a few. From Aug. 25 to September 30, Crain gave up no runs and was generally unhittable.
So, Jesse Crain is back…back as he ever was anyway. His fastball is back up near 94-95 MPH and his slider is getting back to the high 80s. He’s gotten good horizontal break with the slider, but the vertical action is still lacking, and that’s what will determine whether it’s an effective pitch or if it’ll be a hanging pitch—the equivalent of a batting practice fastball.
In the Twins’ bullpen wet dream, Crain’s slider gains a little more bite, he walks a handful fewer batters, and emerges as a lockdown 8th inning reliever as a bridge between Guerrier/Rauch and Joe Nathan. In reality, it’s Crain’s spot to lose in lieu of a better option. Should someone emerge as a viable option in camp, there may be more of a set-up man by committee. However, as it stands now, it’s hard to see anyone besides Crain wearing the 8th inning mantle.
Brian Duensing (LHP, 5-2, 3.64 ERA, -0.183 WXRL)
More of a placeholder than anything, Duensing could easily be replaced with Anthony Swarzak, Francisco Liriano, Glen Perkins, or Jeff Manship. No matter who takes this spot, their job will be to be the long-man, taking over for whichever starter doesn’t have his good stuff one day. My hunch is that Liriano gets the fifth spot in the rotation for sheer potential (he has the best stuff of anyone on staff, just needs to remember how to use it) but Duensing gets this spot as a hat-tip for his work down the stretch in 2009. If Liriano looks shaky, Duensing has shown himself to be capable of taking the ball for 5+ innings, which should be more than enough to keep the rest of the bullpen from tiring out.
Duensing seems better suited for this long relief role than a starting spot, though he certainly pitched well enough last season to warrant a long look in camp. His performance in 2009 wasn’t lucky, per se, his BABIP was right around league average, and his strandrate was a little higher than normal but hardly out of control. Most of the thought that he’ll regress is based on the fact that he outpitched his xFIP and QERA by a pretty fair margin, both are designed to show what a pitcher’s ERA should have been, or perhaps what he deserved to have.
However, it’s important to note that both of those systems favor strikeout pitchers over those that induce contact, which makes sense—a poorly struck ball can still slip through a hole, but a swing and a miss is what it is. Duensing and Nick Blackburn are both guys who induce a lot of weak contact, which isn’t as reliable as someone who strikes out a lot of hitters, but may still be a repeatable skill. If his groundball rate, currently 45.5% were up over 50%, I’d give him a much higher chance of sustaining his low ERA. As it stands, I’m concerned enough about his ability to be a solid starter for a full season to slot him in as a reliever, know that he’s option A1 as soon as someone in the rotation is ineffective or gets injured.
He did accumulate that negative WXRL over the course of 24 relief appearances, a nontrivial sample, so perhaps the Twins will take their chances and put him back in the rotation. We’ll have to wait and see.
Bobby Keppel (RHP, 1-1, 4.83 ERA, 0.279 WXRL)
Keppel’s a last vestige of so many experiments that didn’t work last year. R.A. Dickey, Sean Henn, were others who nearly sundered the Twins’ season in the early part of the season, yet it was Craig Breslow who ended up on another team at season’s end. You can argue about whether or not that was the right move, but one thing is for sure: the Twins need a better option than Bobby Keppel. As things stand now, Keppel figures to see a fair number of short-relief appearances, especially without Pat Neshek for the first part of the season. The appearance of Jon Rauch certainly helps to limit Keppel’s appearances, but he certainly can’t carry the load alone.
Keppel’s 2009 season was by far his best, but he still posted a 1.56 WHIP and a 4.83 ERA as opponents hit .297/.369/.443 off of him. With both Rauch and Mijares vastly superior against lefties, it is fortunate that Keppel is more effective against righties: .278/.360/.426 vs. .317/.379/.462, which would give him a matchup advantage, if his performance against righties wasn’t objectively poor.
Keppel started off with 11.1 scoreless innings, and gave up just one in his first 14 innings of work, but he gave up multiple runs in an appearance twice as often as he gave up just a single run. If it rained, it poured, and that’s not a good attribute for a reliever whose job is to minimize damage, not further open the floodgates. As noted in my analysis of Brian Duensing, the Twins do have a few other options if they want someone who can throw multiple innings, which they may elect to do if no one emerges during spring training.
Pat Neshek (No 2009 line—Injured)
Without question, the biggest puzzle in the Twins’ pen and someone who will likely start the season continuing his rehab in the minors before joining the club at a date defined by both his preparedness and the Twins’ need. Neshek hasn’t pitched in the majors since May 8, 2008, when he left his appearance with what was thought to be a right elbow strain.
One Tommy John surgery later, Neshek should finally be ready to return in 2010. If his delivery was anything resembling normal, projecting his effectiveness would be much easier. Next season would likely be a little rough but 2011should see him back to his old self. However, Neshek’s delivery doesn’t even register on the normal scale, so making a guess as to how effective he’ll be is difficult. Injury guru Will Carroll correctly notes that his odd delivery didn’t help him avoid the injury in the first place, so his delivery certainly won’t make it easier to come back. If he can avoid a subsequent shoulder injury, he could be ok, but if this is the start of a long series of arm injuries, Neshek may be a non-factor for several seasons to come.
Take Away
The Twins are in a better position than they were last year at this time—assuming Jesse Crain is better than R.A. Dickey and assuming that Pat Neshek is better than Crain’s first few months were as the token “fresh off surgery arm”. They still aren’t anything resembling an elite unit unless someone like Swarzak makes the move from starting to relief, and does so very well. Here, like clockwork, I expect at least a comment or two regarding Anthony Slama and/or Rob Delaney. It’s not that I dislike these two, I think there’s a good chance that one or both becomes a decent major league reliever, but there’s a reason neither appeared on anyone’s top 10 prospect list and haven’t for a couple years. I’ve been told by multiple sources that they are among the most overvalued prospects in the Twins’ system, which doesn’t make them bad, but does mean that tempered expectations would be virtuous. Are they likely to be better than R.A. Dickey? Yes, but so is your baby cousin. Are they likely to be better than Keppel? That’s a little less certain. Keppel actually has pretty decent AAA numbers, in some cases better than both Slama and Delaney, so it’s a question of whose game can translate to the Show best, and that’s something we won’t know until we see it.
(Ed. note: According to reports from various sources, Pavano is almost certain to accept arbitration, and the Brewers are pursuing Randy Wolf.)
The Winter Meetings kicked off this morning, and while no blockbusters have been reported as of yet, the buzz has been quite good regarding players like Curtis Granderson, Brad Penny, Milton Bradley, and even Edwin Jackson. The Twins are traditionally lesser players this time of year, 2007 excepted, but that hardly dampens the fun of watching deals get made and forecasting which teams will come out winners in the annual Great Trade Melee.
While they may not be generating much buzz, the Twins are eagerly waiting to hear from Carl Pavano as to whether or not he’ll accept their offer of arbitration. Reports are that Pavano would like to capitalize on last year’s strong finish by signing a two-year deal, but that teams, including the Twins, are more interested in a one-year pact. Pavano said on a number of occasions that he liked pitching for the Twins and liked the staff, so, if everything else is equal, he’ll likely come back to the Twins by accepting arbitration.
However, if he feels he can get that second year from another team, he’s likely to sign with them for the added financial security. While most of the reports now have him leaning toward accepting the Twins’ offer, I find it hard to believe that a team like the Brewers, so badly in need of pitching, wouldn’t take a chance on the second year and sign him if given the chance. He may have to wait until the market bottoms out for them to realize it, but Pavano is a solid option in what has become a very, very shallow market for pitching.
John Lackey is the cream of the crop, said to be a target of the Mets if the Angels can’t resign him, but below him is a precipitous drop off. Eric Bedard and Rich Harden are unbelievably talented pitchers, but both carry such substantial injury risks that they aren’t likely to get much in terms of money or years. Harden has the advantage of having had a fairly healthy 2009, so he’s probably the second best arm on the market. Bedard, Bill Bavasi’s grandest folly, hasn’t made 20 starts in a season since 2007 and made just 30 starts in 2008 and 2009 combined. One could add Ben Sheets to the list of talented-but-injured-aces, as he missed all of 2009 following surgery.
The Third Estate is comprised of veteran arms, third starter types: Justin Duchsherer, Doug Davis, Jose Contreras, and of course, Carl Pavano. Given the quality of those around him, it would be hard to believe anyone but the three pitchers above (Lackey, Sheets, Harden) would be a much more attractive option than Pavano would be. That doesn’t guarantee that he’ll get the deal he wants, but all it takes is one injury in camp and a team could be left scrambling to add a starter. The difference between 1-year, $5 Million and 2-years, $10 Million seems a lot smaller when you’re desperate.
All this is to say, if Pavano returns to play a season in Target Field, I suspect that it will be because he accepted arbitration, which I predicted he would from the get-go.
So, if Pavano returns, it is a good thing for the Twins?
In the sense that if they bring him in, it means that Harden goes off the board, I’d say no, but in any objective evaluation, the answer is probably yes.
Pavano’s one-year bargain with the Indians was largely a ploy to rebuild his value after a horrid stint in New York. Pavano made just 17 starts his first season in the Bronx and then just nine in the next two seasons combined. When he did pitch he was below average and that type of performance isn’t going to win you many fans in New York. His time in Cleveland was unspectacular as he went 9-8 in 21 starts with a 5.37 ERA and a 1.37 WHIP, and while he improved after being traded to the Twins (5-4 in 12 starts, 4.64, 1.37) he was still a bit below league average. His start against the Yankees in Game Three of the playoffs was one of his best of the season, and would have looked a whole lot better if he had been pulled at the end of the 6th when he was clearly gassed.
So why should the Twins be hoping that a reliever who was below average even when he was pitching better accepts their offer to return? Why would they want him back in the first place?
The proof is in the pudding, or the peripherals in this case.
Pavano’s QERA–a predictive stat based on strikeout, walk, and groundball rates, scaled to ERA–was under four and would have been the best on the Twins’ staff. His strand rate was 66.1% (h/t to Over The Baggy), three points below his career average and five points below league average. Combine that with a BABIP well over .300 and you have a lot of runners reaching, and a lot of runners scoring, that normally wouldn’t score. As both of those rates return to normal, Pavano’s ERA and RA will both drop back into normal rates. A decline in BABIP will also portend a drop in his WHIP, and that doesn’t even factor in improved defense behind him.
Pavano will slot in at the three or four spot in the rotation depending on how Nick Blackburn pitches, so even if he’s around league average, he’ll give the Twins much better production than they got out of either Glen Perkins or Francisco Liriano. I think there’s an excellent chance that he rates slightly above league average and finally earns the long-term deal he’s been hoping for in the 2010 offseason.
The announcements of players offered arbitration made Twins fans happy last weekend as three names being bandied about—Placido Polanco, Orlando Hudson, and Felipe Lopez were all set free by their respective teams. This was particularly important for Hudson and Polanco, since due to their Type-A status, they would have cost a first-round pick to sign. In the past, the Twins have been reticent to sign players and give up their pick, so this was indeed a prime development.
All in all, these decisions expanded the pool of players that might fit the Twins’ needs. Adrian Beltre, Marco Scutaro, Chone Figgins, Polanco, Lopez, and Hudson have all been named in connection with the Twins, and each of them makes a certain amount of sense given the team’s needs.
However, as soon as that pool open, it got significantly shallower. Scutaro, Figgins, and Polanco lasted less than a week before Boston, Seattle, and Philly snapped them up. While this may be seen as a bad thing for the Twins, it’s actually quite good. Of the three players signed, only Polanco was a serious target for the Twins, and, as many people have noted, his three-year deal will take him into his age-37 season. To say that by that point he’ll likely be in the decline phase of his career is a gross understatement.
Not only were the players signed not Twins targets, the teams that signed them were those notorious for disrupting the market for the other players. Had the Red Sox decided to pursue Orlando Hudson, for example, they could have offered more in terms of both money and years than the Twins were likely to offer, making signing him extremely difficult. With the Mariners, Phillies, and Sawx now sated, the Twins will be dueling teams more in the tax bracket for the services of the rest of their trade targets.
With a level playing field, the Twins now have a chance to go after the player the think will best help their team, which makes correctly identifying their weaknesses that much more critical. If you can have what you want, you’d better be sure of your choice.
As I noted previously, the Twins were a poor defensive team and a pretty adept offensive one. They were the fifth best offensive team in baseball in terms of runs scored per game, but average or worse depending on your choice of defensive metrics. While the addition of JJ Hardy will help, they could use another sure glove. Another consideration is the extremely poor performance the Twins got out of the #2 spot in their order. Orlando Cabrera’s .314 OBP ahead of Joe Mauer was a great improvement over what the Twins had gotten before his arrival, but still brought the team line up to just .262/.306/.394, and even that was inflated by Mauer’s 123 ABs at a .398/.451/.707 clip.
While J.J. Hardy could be slotted into the second spot, which would leave the Twins looking for someone to hit 6th or 7th, his .218/.281/.323 line last year would have been part of the problem, not a solution. His career line as a second hitter is certainly hopeful enough, .272/.322/.467, but there are serious concerns to be had about Hardy producing that line in a harder league, especially when he failed to do so last year.
This brings us to a player I feel is the best fit for the Twins: Felipe Lopez.
2009 was very, very kind to Lopez, as he had his best season as a professional. His 2005 season in Cincinnati was a little better offensively, but his defense was much better in 2009. Still, his .310/.383/.427 line was well above average, as evidenced by his OPS+ of 111 and his EqA of .286. His move away from Arizona, paradoxically, improved his offensive output as he hit much better in the second half, .301/.364/.412 vs. .320/.407/.448. Having that kind of player ahead of Joe Mauer would create a many more run scoring opportunities for the offense. So it’s an open-and-shut case, right? Lock him up!
Well, not quite.
Much like Adrian Beltre circa 2004, Lopez had an uncharacteristically good year just in time to hit the free agent market. His career line isn’t much to crow about:.269/.338/.400, better than Brendan Harris’, but not necessarily the line you want to add for 7-8 million a year, especially when you factor in a career strikeout percentage of nearly 19%. His defense, too, hasn’t been the stuff of legends. His career UZR at short (where he played from 2001-2007) is a reprehensible -42.3, he’s never posted a positive figure at the position in his career.
But the Twins aren’t buying his career, they’re buying his future, and while career numbers are useful for sniffing out one-year wonders, players can and do improve over time and Lopez is one of those players.
He broke into the bigs at age 21 with the Toronto Blue Jays in 2001, but didn’t play a full season until he was traded to the Reds in 2005. Since that point, he’s hit .280/.349/.407, which is close to the line he posted this season, and which makes it look much less like an aberration. If he posts that type of season ahead of Mauer and a healthy Justin Morneau, he’ll provide a very similar offensive boost to what Orlando Cabrera gave the Twins at the end of 2009.
But, if you’ve been tracking with me, you’ll notice that I’ve made two defensive notes so far. First, the Twins need to improve it, and second Lopez is bad at it. Only that’s not quite right. Lopez is bad at shortstop, true, but he no longer plays there, nor would the Twins want him to. Lopez was moved to second base for 1/3rd of his games in 2007, and was clearly much better there than he was at short. His full time debut was less inspiring in 2008, back to 5.3 runs below average, but he rebounded in 2009 to 7.8 runs above average. If his entire career had been played there, I’d be worried this was unusual, but as far as second base is concerned, he’s spent more time above average than below it. He was the fifth best defender at second base in 2009, while he may regress, I don’t think he’ll all of a sudden become a defensive ditch.
I understand the reasons for being wary of Lopez, but if he puts together a season like the one that seems within his grasp, 2009 won’t look like an aberration, and whoever signs him will get a tremendous return on what seems like it will be a fair investment.
The free-agent market officially opened last week, heralded in by a flurry of important signings that could truly change the game. Or a general malaise, one of the two, I forget which.
Anyone who studies market trends in baseball can tell you that a high volume of deals get done as the windows are are closing, not opening. Deals will get done between now and well into spring training as teams try to patch holes without creating new ones and without taking on an ungodly amount of salary. The same is true with the trade deadline; sure, players get moved early in the season, but the last week of July is lousy with players flying from one team to the other. Perhaps if the windows were smaller there would be more action. GMs bidding like floor traders, elbowing each other out of the way to talk to key agents, eventually a huge fight breaks out in the lobby of the Indianapolis Omni hotel with winning getting the right to sign Jason Bay for too much money.
As much as I’d like to see the Twins go after a pitcher next, the rumblings I’ve heard are that they are still interested in the infield. I certainly can’t blame them, there are puzzles aplenty in there, so with one of the seasons’ hot trade targets already in the fold, let’s check out the other.
Dan Uggla may best be remembered for his 2008 All-Star Game appearance in which he committed three errors and went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts and a GIDP, but that’s certainly a far cry from his usual performance. A career .243/.344/.482 hitter, the soon to be 30 year old second baseman has been largely overshaddowed by his double-play mate, one Hanley Ramirez. Still, Uggla has been an above average hitter in each of the last four seasons, hitting more than 25 home runs every season he’s been in the majors and never posting an OPS below .800. His EqA—a measure of his total offensive contribution, prorated by league difficulty, home park, and opposing pitching—has never dipped below the league average mark of .260, meaning he’s always been an offensive asset irrespective of position. When positional factors are taken into account, he’s worth about the same number of wins as Orlando Hudson, Nelson Cruz, and Aramis Ramirez, not at all a bad company to be in.
Last season, Uggla’s numbers fell off a little bit, dropping from .260/.360/.514 to. 243/.354/.459 due in no small part to a regression in his batting average on balls in play–from .320 in 2008 to .274 last year. That figure was never going to stay that high, so a drop in batting average should have been expected. One thing that bodes well for Uggla is that he kept his on-base percentage at almost the same level even with the drop in BA. His strikeouts were down both in relative (27.6% to 22.5%) and absolute terms (171 to 150) and his walk rate jumped from 12.4% to 13.8%.
One major concern I have about Uggla is his home/road split. His home park is a bit of a launching pad, one of the most hitter friendly in the majors in fact, and Uggla is a bit of a product of that. His home line—.251/.386/.513—is good for an OPS+ 21 points above average, or loosely as good as Matt Kemp and Denard Span were over the full season. His away numbers—.235/.321/.408—turned him into Pedro Feliz or Miguel Cairo, 20 points below average. Over his career, the same split exists, though it’s smaller—just 10 points.
I would be more concerned about that split if it were lower across the board, that is, if his away line was .200/.291/.360, I’d be prepared to pass no matter the price. As it stands, even if his away line becomes his overall stats, he’d still be better than any of the hitters the Twins had batting second last season. Additionally, with the addition of JJ Hardy (who has batted second in the order for almost his entire career), Uggla will probably bat seventh or eighth in the order. His power is legitimate wherever he’s playing, he hit 13 no doubt home runs this season, good for 3rd in the NL.
If the Twins aren’t really in need of a marquee hitter, which since the next hitter they acquire will be their 6th hitter at best, then they need to be looking at defense as much as offense. Uggla’s is…enigmatic.
According to UZR, Uggla’s four full seasons have produced lines of 6.9, -9.3, 1.6, and -10.1; Baseball Prospectus’ FRAA (Fielding Runs Above Average) is a little more stable: 5, -19,-2,-1, at least stable enough to draw conclusions from. Uggla is well above replacement level, but below average overall. While he isn’t the guy who made three errors in the All-Star Game, he’s not making anyone forget Joe Morgan. He was close to Alexi Casilla’s level this year, but he is clearly a much better hitter, and thus has a much higher overall value.
If the Twins do bring in Uggla, it will be with the knowledge that he’s a passable defender at second, but hoping that he hits well enough to justify being in there (and having Nick Punto at third base, another consequence of adding a player at second.)
So what we have is a great offensive player whose production will decline because of a switch to the AL and may decline even more if his home/road splits hold up, and whose defense isn’t going to be there to help cushion the fall. Does that mean the Twins shouldn’t look at Uggla? Not necessarily, but they need to understand that they won’t be getting the player who hit .243/.354/.482, and while he may not fall off precipitously, it’s much more likely that he’ll stay on the low side of his career numbers rather than rebound. This is why the increase in walk rate is so critical—plate discipline isn’t something that varies by league.
If he were a free agent, looking only for money and a place to play, I’d be a lot more eager to acquire him. However, not only will Florida be looking for a good return for their two-time All-Star, Uggla will also be looking for a raise during arbitration. He made $5.35 Million in his first year of arbitration and will almost certainly make 1-2 more this season, which would put the Twins to around $80 Million (assuming, perhaps unfairly, that Uggla is acquired and no one from the 25 man roster heads the other way). I can’t imagine payroll going too much higher than that, and, as I’ve noted before, the Twins need to address their rotation. If they feel they can get Carl Pavano back for 2-3 million plus incentives (unlikely), perhaps they could add both he and Uggla, but if they want to pursue Rich Harden, Ben Sheets, or even (heaven forbid it) Jarrod Washburn, they probably will not have the flexibility to accommodate Uggla’s arbitration raise. As previously noted, removing one or more members from the 25-man roster would change these numbers a bit, but if, say Perkins and Casilla, were heading to South Florida, the money saved wouldn’t cover even the raise Uggla was due, let alone his entire contract.
I’m not opposed to Uggla as a player, and for a team like the Cubs, he could make a lot of sense. However, given that Uggla’s arrival would signal not only a jettisoning of a possibly useful player or two in a trade, but also an inability to bring in a high quality pitcher or third baseman, I just don’t see it being the best move for the Twins right now. Should a pitcher join Uggla on his trip north, however, that would change the calculus of this deal substantially.
For years, the BBWAA picks for the Cy Young Awards and MVP were the subject of incredible scorn, especially among the sabermetric community. The 2005 AL Cy Young, for example, saw Bartolo Colon, armed with a 21-8 record, beat Johan Santana despite being subordinate to him in every category besides wins—three wins worse according to Baseball Prospectus’ Wins Above Replacement Player. Every team has their example, every year seems to bring new controversy, but 2009 seems to have been a big step in the right direction.
Zack Greinke netted the AL Cy Young, despite winning just 16 games, the lowest win totals for a Cy Young winner since 1994. There was some controversy over the NL award, but that was a choice among three deserving candidates, someone had to lose.
The BBWAA’s strong year continued Monday with the selection of Joe Mauer as the American League’s Most Valuable Player.
When I wrote about Mauer’s candidacy in mid-August, the primary argument against Mauer was that he didn’t play for a winning team. Had the season ended there, there would have been a big argument over whether Mauer’s superior numbers for a team that finished below .500 and in third place in a comparatively weaker division would be enough to propel him ahead of Mark Teixeira or Derek Jeter, who played a key role on a superior squad.
Fortunately for the Twins, that argument was done in by two months of solid play led by Mauer’s strong close to the season. With friend and fellow All-Star Justin Morneau on the pine, Mauer closed the season with a .391/.449/.652 line in August and .354/.471/.487 in September and a few games in October, simultaneously making the Twins a winning team and showing himself to be a clutch performer.
Philosophical arguments aside, Mauer was nothing short of dominant. He won the slash stat triple crown, boasting the highest batting average (.365), On-base percentage (.444), and slugging percentage (.587) in the AL, with only Albert Pujols’ and Prince Fielder’s slugging percentage preventing him from the major league mark. In the last 70 years, this has only been done nine times. Of those nine, seven were achieved by a first baseman, a left fielder, or a right fielder (hat tip to Ken Funck at Baseball Prospectus). Just twice coming into the season had an up-the-middle player hit anything approaching this well. Add in his 28 home runs, best among catchers, and 19.2% OBI%[percentage of runners on-base ahead of him that he successfully drove in], and it’s easy to see just how big a role he played in the Twins’ success.
But traditional stats can paint false pictures, perhaps advanced metrics will reveal Mauer’s flaw.
It looks as though Ben Zobrist won FanGraphs’ Wins Above Replacement crown at first blush, except that Joe Mauer gets no credit for his defense, since the defensive component of WAR (Ultimate Zone Rating or UZR) doesn’t categorize catchers. Giving Mauer credit for even average defense would push him over the top there.
Baseball Prospectus’ Value over Replacement Player has Mauer just a tick behind Albert Pujols and well ahead of the rest of the field, 20 runs ahead of Jeter and close to double Teixeira’s contribution. Tex chipped in a few more Equivalent Runs, but Mauer’s Equivalent Average was much, much higher. Among position players, Mauer ran away with the AL WARP-1 crown, though he did finish behind Zack Greinke. (To be honest, there’s a debate to be had as to whether Mauer or Greinke was more valuable to his team, a question that just isn’t salient when the players are Mauer and…any other player in the AL.)
When positional considerations are included, Mauer blows away the rest of the field. His contributions in terms of controlling a young pitching staff and adjusting to an uncharacteristically unsettled rotation are just two of the things that make catching uniquely difficult. The fact that other positions don’t have to deal with these issues shouldn’t take away from players like Jeter and Teixeira, but it is something that makes Mauer that much more valuable to his team.
I would love to tell you that this was a close vote, or that there are a lot of things that make this a difficult decision, and if the voters would actually vote for pitchers. Between Mauer and Greinke, I’m inclined to say that Mauer is still the MVP, but I’m certainly willing to hear arguments to the contrary. Irrespective, the voters have made it abundantly clear that a pitcher’s place is not in the MVP voting. In a battle between Joe Mauer and the rest of the position players in the American League, it just isn’t close.
The voters got this one right, continuing their strong showing in 2009, Joe Mauer truly is the American League’s Most Valuable Player
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