The Twins are ready to make some changes. While I agree something probably should be done at this point, I just hope they don't do the wrong ones. Getting Casilla out of there is obvious, but this is the part that has me concerned:
The club also is concerned third baseman Danny Valencia has regressed defensively and is not the player he was last season, when he batted .311 in 85 games as a rookie and was solid in the field. Valencia is batting only .211, and his defense has been shaky at times. Manager Ron Gardenhire also has not been happy with Valencia's baserunning.
Valencia actually leads the Twins with 13 RBI, but that's more a reflection of the struggling players around him. Some with the club believe Luke Hughes' best position is third base, but there have been no indications the club is ready to make a change there for now.
I'll give them that Valencia hasn't been as good as last year on defense, but the defensive metrics say he has gone from a terrific defensive player to slightly below average. He's only been credited with two errors. And at this point in his career it's more likely this first month of the season is a fluke than three months last season, although we really don't have enough defensive data to make any true judgments at this point.
However, as for his offense, Valencia has a .225 BABIP after having a .345 BABIP last year, so he went to being somewhat fortunate (the Twins had a .306 team BABIP last year) to extremely unfortunate. Valencia actually leads the Twins in walks with 11 and only has 13 strikeouts for by far the best K/BB rate on the team. He has increased his walk rate from last year, dropped his strikeout rate and maintained the same line-drive rate, which is right at the major league average.
As for baserunning, I'll give them that he hasn't been aggressive enough, but he hasn't regressed in that area, he just hasn't improved. Last year, he only took an extra base 25 percent of the time, while the Twins as a whole did it 41 percent. This year, Valencia is at 23 percent in very few opportunities, so he has essentially remained the same. He may not be aggressive, but at least he isn't costing the team outs on the basepaths.
The Twins have many problems, but I don't think Valencia is one of them. Unfortunately, he hasn't been around long enough to get a free pass like many others are getting. I hope his luck changes before the Twins do something stupid.
Starting for the Twins at second base, shortstop, third base, and catcher: Michael Cuddyer!
Would we get to implement ghost runners? I imagine they'd be more fleet of foot than Cuddles.
The first baserunning "mistake" I remember from Valencia was after he hit one a single with Kubel on second and either one or no outs (pretty sure none). Danny, being aggressive, went around first and headed to second, to either draw the throw and let Kubes score, or so the Twins would then have a runner still in scoring position with one out if the throw did go home and get Kubel. Liddle held Kubel up at second, for whatever reason, Valencia out at second, and I believe that was the first "WTF" moment for me this year.
Danny is not the problem. Coaches need to get their s*** together, and the team needs to get healthy.
He's been taking extra bases less often than the rest of the team, which is pretty slow in general, especially last year. Gardy complained about both Kubel and Valencia not being able to score from second base on a single in the same game the other day and the Twins lost by one run. Neither of them got a good read or didn't know where the outfielders were.
Yeah, I'm just thinking that that early screwup maybe is messing with his head a bit, making him even more cautious than he already was.
Of everything LEN III says in that article, this was the thing that really surprised me. Maybe it shouldn't have.
Cuddy has been only slightly below the league average at 2nd in fielding percentage and only 1 run below average in defensive "runs worth". Now, he's only played 7 games at 2nd, but to me he hasn't looked completely overmatched there...I guess I just wasn't expecting them to consider plugging him in there long term.
My concern would be Thome breaking down by the end of the season because the Twins would be overusing him. Hopefully, Hughes can be used more as a DH or Repko as a corner outfielder with Kubel DHing against lefties. I'm not sure if Thome could even be expected to be the full-time left-handed portion of a DH platoon.
Cuddy has been only slightly below the league average at 2nd in fielding percentage
*covers his eyes*
Wait, what did I say? SSS? Thought I covered that - only played 7 games. Is fielding percentage not a valid measure of defensive skill; statistically irrelevant to actual performance...what? Man alive this place hurts my head sometimes.
Fielding percentage is an awful measure of defense. It was bad when invented and it is bad now. At this point, your eyes would be the best indicator, so long as you remember if watching on TV then you miss a second of reaction.
I've admitted as much before, I'm not a numbers guy. I know hitting .300 is a good season and I've learned that a .400 OBP is amazing and anything over 1.000 is an all-star caliber OPS. I also understand* how to calculate those numbers...not so with anything defense-related. Which defensive metrics are worth repeating and what would "good" comparisons be?
*though I couldn't pull the formulas out of my head - I'd have to look 'em up.
Ultimate Zone Rating (UZR) is a pretty decent and readily available stat. If you're interested in learning more, FanGraphs has a primer on UZR, and the numbers to date are available on each player page and on the leaderboards.
Dewan's +/- are another popular source, though I haven't found a site that provides them free.
Tom Tango usually does an annual "Fan's Scouting Report" that is pretty cool, as well. The idea here is that if a bunch of people who watch a bunch of games give their opinions on a players defense, it will be a good indicator of that player's true defensive ability, broken into 5(I think) categories.
FanGraphs provides +/-, but calls it rPM. I believe that is the equivalent to that published elsewhere (Bill James' site I think?) but named as "+/-".
Also available is TZ and TZL. They are the same but TZL uses Gameday data to better identify where a ball passes through the infield. You can think of both as TotalZone with beginning of time through 2004 as original TZ and 2005-now as TZL. B-R has the same system but doesn't differentiate by name.
Finally, someday, there will be nFRAA on BP.
it's not irrelevant, but remember that the "error" is a subjective decision by an official scorer. It is generally agreed that unless someone is making a rather large number of errors, looking at statistics that tell you how often players get to balls they should get to (i.e. range) is way more important. After all, you can't make an error on a ball you never reach.
The only way to make an error at Target Field is to have kick the ball, then pick it up, double-pump and finally throw the ball onto Target Plaza. Anything less than that, and it's a hit.
Is Jose Reyes available? The Mets want a top young pitcher? I would assume Kyle Gibson would qualify. What about Kevin Slowey or Brian Duensing? Would the Twins need to extend Reyes first? Is there even the slightest chance of this happening?
If Gibson is as decent as everyone says, do we want to give him up for a Jose Reyes rental?
I'd say "no." If Gibson projects to be a 2-3 WAR/year pitcher through his indentured servitude, that's an expected "profit" of what, $8 million to $14+ million per year, right?
Early returns on Reyes suggest he's back to his 5-6 WAR/year form. Isn't it reasonable to expect him to be looking for something in the $15m/year-$20m/year range or more? Somehow, I don't see that as very likely for the Twins.
If the Twins could sign him for like 5 years at $14-15 million per or something like that, I think it would be a worthwhile signing. Especially with Nathan and Cuddyer coming off the books next year. I wouldn't give up Gibson, Hicks or Sano in a deal for Reyes, but I'd consider nearly anyone else.
Watched parts of this last night on FS North. Refreshing memory, but my how the mighty have fallen.
Don't we have enough problems that we have to go inventing new ones? For a team that's had such a long run of success, it's like every bad decision is coming back to haunt the Twins right now.
Well, except for jettisoning the Cubans back in 2006.
Speaking of bad luck (to put it mildly), LENIII says that minor leaguer Paul Bargas has brain cancer (he's who we got in the Jose Morales trade). My heart goes out to him and his family.