Another season, another postseason prediction contest, but two days late. Spoiler your predictions below. They are due by first pitch of today's game. Add the number of games to win the series for a possible bonus.
ALWC: TBR at OAK
NLWC: WSH
ALDS: MIN at NYY
ALDS: TBR/OAK at HOU
NLDS: STL at ATL
NLDS: WSH at LAD
ALCS:
NLCS:
World Series:
Here we go, playoff baseball. Milwaukee Brewers at Washington Nationals. Hottest team in baseball versus Max Scherzer.
Let's have some fun. First pitch at 7:08p
I figured I should write at least something on my obsession with the Twins home run record chase, but before I do, I would like to point out that the Twins staff has only allowed 195 homers this year. That's second in the AL behind Tampa, who just allowed one to the Yanks in two games. In fact, let's look at the AL playoff teams (as of Wednesday):
Rays: 177
Twins: 195
A's: 200
Indians: 200
Astros: 226
Yankees: 244
So the Yankees have barely scored more than the Twins, give up way more homers, and have a worse ERA+. So why have the Yankees been better? The Yankees have given up 45 unearned runs. The Twins, 74. Eeeg. If the Twins lose in the playoffs because of their atrocious defense...
Anyway, back to bombas.
The Twins are up two homers with three games to go. Neither team is really playing for anything. For the Yankees to get home field, they'd have to sweep while the Astros get swept. Not likely. So it's reasonable to think both teams will be resting players. The Twins will be matching up Astudillo and Miller and Torreyes with the likes of Romine and Estrada and Wade. And, honestly, probably Giancarlo Stanton, who needs some reps before the playoffs. The Twins will likely play Schoop a lot, who if he can do anything it's hit bombs in low-pressure situations.
The Yanks are playing the Rangers, who have given up 17 more homers than the Royals. The Rangers also play in a more homer friendly park.
Let's look at projected starters and their HR/9:
Rangers: Palumbo (2.6), TBD (?), Lynn (0.9)
Royals: Skoglund (1.5), Sparkman (2.1), Lopez (1.8)
I think I've finally come to the point where I'll be okay if the Twins don't get this record. Clinching the division has helped for sure. Though no promises if the Twins are leading by three homers on Sunday and the Yankees hit four.
Every time I've bitched to nibbish about the Yankees hitting homers, he has replied with "Don't worry, they've got this."
Om.
Magic number is still 7.
Montgomery on the hill for Kansas City.
Gibson toes the rubber for Minnesota.
Playing Kansas City, Cleveland, Chicago and Detroit in the final weeks of the season got me thinking. Every team in the American League Central has played in the World Series ... except Minnesota. Every team in the Central has made an appearance in the past 15 years (though the only teams to win it was were Kansas City in 2015 and Chicago in 2005) and in the entire league, only Seattle has seen a longer absence from the ALCS than Minnesota, by 1 year (Milwaukee, who made the NLCS last year, last reached the ALCS in 1982).
Not to put the cart before the horse - gotta win the game, then the division, then (lord willing) the league first - but I’d say Minnesota is due.
*corrected
Prediction time! With the Twins Magic Number at 9, and a relatively easy 13 game schedule from here on out, a Twins Central Division win is a near certainty. So let’s do a contest when the Twins will outright clinch the division. Below is the schedule for both teams to help you decide. The earliest the Twins could clinch is this Friday September 20th.
| Day | Date | MN Game | CLE Game |
|---|---|---|---|
| M | 9.16 | CWS@MN | |
| TU | 9.17 | CWS@MN | DET@CLE |
| W | 9.18 | CWS@MN | DET@CLE |
| TH | 9.19 | KC@MN | DET@CLE |
| F | 9.20 | KC@MN | PHI@CLE |
| SA | 9.21 | KC@MN | PHI@CLE |
| SU | 9.22 | KC@MN | PHI@CLE |
| M | 9.23 | ||
| TU | 9.24 | MN@DET | CLE@CWS |
| W | 9.25 | MN@DET | CLE@CWS |
| TH | 9.26 | MN@DET | CLE@CWS |
| F | 9.27 | MN@KC | CLE@WAS |
| SA | 9.28 | MN@KC | CLE@WAS |
| SU | 9.29 | MN@KC | CLE@WAS |
Put your prediction in the comments below (spoiler if you want). Try to get them in by say before Tuesday's game. Then sit back and see when the Twins will be sipping (and spilling) champagne.
I'm stealing this from Sean McInhoe at The Athletic, but he did it with hockey, and I'm suggesting that we do it with baseball, so it's totally different.
New post: It's August and not much is happening in the NHL, so let's ruin your productivity for the day by playing the $200 Lineup Game. https://t.co/9hGtWONYPr pic.twitter.com/6v4XvbO6Xq
— Down Goes Brown (@DownGoesBrown) August 6, 2019
We'll need a slightly bigger team, and a bigger budget due to the longer seasons, but we can make this work.
Here's my sample Phillies team. They're pretty stacked (Ryne Sandberg's 68 WAR for $13 didn't make the cut)
| Pos | Player | Cost | WAR |
| P | Pedro Martinez | $9 | 83.9 |
| P | Kid Nichols | $21 | 116.1 |
| C | Benito Santiago | $136 | 27.3 |
| 1B | Jimmie Foxx | $89 | 96.6 |
| 2B | Joe Morgan | $123 | 100.6 |
| 3B | Tony Perez | $91 | 54 |
| SS | Julio Franco | $16 | 43.5 |
| OF | Hack Wilson | $7 | 38.9 |
| OF | Hunter Pence | $155 | 30.7 |
| OF | Hugh Duffy | $34 | 43.1 |
| TOTAL | $681 | 634.7 |
Who did I miss? What franchise would run away with this?
It’s been a while since Twins fans could look forward to the trade deadline with confidence the club was a full-on buyer, so it seems like we deserve a dedicated post to discuss rumors, share wish lists, and react to any deals the front office makes.
For convenience, here’s a hotlink to all MLBTR posts tagged for the Twins.
Bonus points to the Citizen who identifies the pitcher in this photo without cheating.
The 2019 Twins are officially half-baked. No, literally.
The Twins played their last game of the first half yesterday. It was another ugly end to a pretty solid game, which is hopefully sufficient signal to the front office to turn the pan & lower the heat. With the loss, the 2019 club fell from a tie with the 2001 Twins for the third-best winning percentage over the first half of a season since the franchise moved to Minnesota.
| Team | W% | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1970 | .659 | 1st |
| 1965 | .646 | 2nd |
| 2001 | .632 | 3rd |
| 2019 | .629 | 4th |
| 1969 | .615 | 5th |
| 1992 | .609 | 6th |
I've included the top six for two reasons. First, those are all the clubs with a .600 or above winning percentage in the first half. Second, those teams were not too bad: one pennant, two excellent division champs, a squad motivated by the owner's collusive attempt to contract the team, and the follow-up squad to the 1991 World Champions. The 1991 Twins were, in fact, the next team on the first-half leaderboard, at .566. So, how did these squads fare in the second half?
| Team | W% | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1965 | .613 | 5th |
| 1991 | .608 | 7th |
| 1969 | .576 | 12th |
| 1970 | .550 | 16th |
| 1992 | .493 | 27th |
| 2001 | .400 | 51st |
Here we see the challenge ahead. Each of these teams cooled off in the second half — it's pretty hard to continue winning nearly two-thirds of the games you play. The 1991 Twins make their appearance here, and it makes sense that the top four teams all won their divisions or better. The second half swoon that sunk the '92 Twins is modest compared to the bottom that fell out of the young League of Nations/Soul Patrol team. The 2019 Twins’ postseason odds — 99.3% at the end of the first half — are as encouraging as we’ve seen in years, behind one of the most impressive half-seasons in franchise history. (It beats 2011–2017, that’s for sure.) Oddly enough, their World Series odds increased after the loss yesterday, up to 14.2%.
Even with the bats of ass they've been swinging over the last couple weeks, the Bomba Squad has obliterated the ‘64 Twins’ first half record home run record by 41 bombas. The 166 homers of the first half equals the club's full-season total last year. Not bad. When healthy, there aren't many holes in this lineup. The injury bug has stretched the team thin, but the excellent depth of this roster has helped maintain altitude throughout the turbulence.
The most notable hole appears to be a solid, three-position reserve outfielder. Depending on who is available, Gonzalez, Astudillo, Adrianza, and Arraez have been able to plug holes in the corners, but none of them are natural outfielders. Jake Cave has been beyond mediocre — .176/.299/.243 (49 OPS+) — despite a slightly lower SO% and nearly double BB% over last season. His line drive rate is down from 31% to 24%, and his HR% has dropped 75% from last year. That all adds up to a BABIP .101 lower than 2018. His numbers at Rochester are actually significantly better this year than last season — .327/.370/.536 vs. .269/.352/.403 — which probably explains why he's continuing to be in the mix as guys cycle through the injured list. With three center field-capable starting outfielders, the Twins are in a much better position than they could be, were Cave their only alternative to Buxton.
Meanwhile, Luis Arraez has had an incredible first half. Even though his average finally fell below .400, he's still had one of the best starts to a rookie season in Twins history:
| Year | Player | Age | OPS+ |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Arraez | 22 | 162 |
| 1963 | Hall | 25 | 160 |
| 2004 | Mauer | 21 | 146 |
| 1976 | Wynegar | 20 | 140 |
| 1967 | Carew | 21 | 137 |
Here's a list of Twins who have equaled or exceeded Arraez' 1.0 rWAR in 200 or fewer PA:
| Year | Player | Age | rWAR | PA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2004 | Mauer | 21 | 1.4 | 122 |
| 1971 | J. Nettles | 24 | 1.2 | 190 |
| 2019 | Adrianza | 29 | 1.1 | 143 |
| 2010 | Casilla | 25 | 1.1 | 170 |
| 2019 | Arraez | 22 | 1.0 | 95 |
| 1970 | Ratliff | 26 | 1.0 | 171 |
| 1962 | Mincher | 24 | 1.0 | 157 |
Arraez' hot start has been fueled by a .413 BABIP, which is higher than he's ever managed in the minors. He had a .376 BABIP through 164 PA at Pensacola this year, up from .315 over 195 PA in Chattanooga in 2018. His highest BABIP — .382 over 514 PA — came at Cedar Rapids in 2016. So, a high BABIP seems to be a repeatable skill for Arraez, even if it's a bit overinflated right now.
Finally, depth has been a sore spot in our conversations about the pitching staff. I'll admit that my mind has been shifting from bolstering the rotation to stacking the bullpen in recent weeks. Berríos has been awesome. Kyle Gibson is, at this point, Kyle Gibson. I'm holding my breath that Pineda's improvements hold, Odorizzi's blister heals, and Pérez stays in his May/June form. Two of those guys won't be starting games after September, assuming the season maintains the present course. Much as I hate paying through the nose for relievers — this was a very addressable problem between November and February — bullpen arms are what will allow the starters to stay fresh the rest of the way, and what will shut down strong opponents' lineups after the fifth inning in the postseason.
So, let's finish with a few questions:
On Joe Mauer's player page, Baseball Reference lists two transactions:
This community did not exist before Joe Mauer became a major leaguer. Mauer made his debut on 05 April 2004; SBG started posting at the Old Basement in July 2004. Granted, there were isolated pockets of Twins fans online before Mauer crouched behind the plate, but every one of the well-established communities of Twins fans came into being during Mauer's career. The Mauer Era is the era of critical mass for Twins fans online. The retirement of Joe's number is something of a milestone for all of us.
The seeds of the ongoing revolution in the evaluation of baseball players' performance stretch back to before Joe Mauer was born. By the time Mauer was swinging the bat on St. Paul's sandlots, a few forward-thinking executives had started kicking around these new approaches. By the time Joe Mauer signed with the Twins, those approaches had already jumped from theory to application in the most forward-thinking front office in the game. (That front office was not in Minnesota.)
Joe Mauer's career unfolded in a period in which enlightened baseball executives, baseball bloggers, and a few sportswriters were capable of perceiving how legendarily good Mauer was, but in which traditional executives, old school players, and (especially) sports-writing newspapermen simply lacked the curiosity, imagination, or willingness to appreciate him. The Twins' front office remained so hidebound in its approach that Mauer's own organization was simply not capable of articulating the special abilities of its franchise catcher. In Mauer's own home state, some newspapermen conspired to poison the well, turning a huge percentage of fans against the best pure hitter they might ever see play for their favorite team. Nothing in Joe Mauer's personality suggests he brought this treatment on himself. His "crime" was to be judged a good enough ballplayer to be made a multi-millionaire by the children of a billionaire banker.
Had Mauer's career unfolded exactly as it had, but a decade later, we would know with much greater certainty how amazing he was behind the plate. We know a few things. He threw out 33% of runners attempting to steal against a cumulative league average of 27% during his catching years. Baseball Info Solutions judges him about 17 runs above average in pitch calling. Johan Santana, the best pitcher to toe the rubber for the Twins since Bert Blyleven's heyday and likely the best pitcher in the American League during his own peak, threw more innings to Joe Mauer than any other catcher in his career. The only catcher with whom Johan had a lower OPS+ allowed was Ramon Castro, who caught less than a quarter of the total innings Mauer caught Johan. We can guess other things — Mauer certainly was a very good receiver, and possibly inner-circle great at framing — but we'll simply never know how he compares to the excellent catchers who came after him.
But we do know this: very, very few catchers could hit like Joe Mauer in his prime. Joe Mauer had the fifth-highest peak, judged by rWAR, of any catcher, ever. In ten seasons, from 2004–2013, Joe Mauer hit .323/.405/.468, good for an 135 OPS+. Over that span, which included a debut season derailed by a knee injury, he ripped an average of 28 doubles every year. He got an extra-base hit in 8% of his plate appearances over that stretch, but struck out just 11.2% of the time. He totaled 2051 total bases in a decade of hitting, often banged-up from his duties on the back side of the plate. Of players who caught at least 750 games and had at least 3000 plate appearances, Mauer is 3rd in Batting Runs, 7th in WAR Runs Batting, and 8th in Runs Created.
Joe Mauer was ours. He arrived just as we were gaining the ability to follow baseball with new friends we had never met, who lived far away from the territory reached by the 50,000 watts of WCCO that then still carried Herb's voice. His career was, with the exception of the disappointments his team suffered in the postseason, the career of all of our dreams when we were growing up. Nobody — especially not the cranks at the Star Tribune and their sycophants online — can take Joe Mauer's greatness away from us. We knew it, and we shared it.
Happy Joe Mauer Day, friends.
Sure, let's do this. I can make an actual post, and then later I can put things into a spreadsheet so that someone else can figure things out even later, right?
Spoiler your predictions for the following:
AL East
AL Central
AL West
WC
WC
NL East
NL Central
NL West
WC
WC
AL WC
ALDS (2)
ALCS
NL WC
NLDS (2)
NLCS
WS (including total games)
AL MVP
AL CY
AL ROY
AL Manager
NL MVP
NL CY
NL ROY
NL Manager
First Manager Fired
Twins’ end-of-season WAR leaders for position players & pitchers
